tiny seeded melon

[Nicholas Locke]

The irony of using Carol Deppe as an example,  as her Goldini Zucchini is just that,  dual purpose.

I'm not necessarily breeding for edible seeds,  but i don't see why both couldn't be accomplished if one wanted.

True Andrew,
But If you wanted a melon with nice flesh and lots and lots of large seeds for eating, (which would be quite easy to breed for) I would say the draw back to that is it would be a pain in the arse to eat!
there is always a trade off in everything. I think it all depends on the situation..

[Dominic J]

The irony of using Carol Deppe as an example,  as her Goldini Zucchini is just that,  dual purpose.

I'm not necessarily breeding for edible seeds,  but i don't see why both couldn't be accomplished if one wanted.

Well, the more traits you select for, the harder it is to select for extreme performance in any given trait. Individual plants excelling in one trait are rare, plants excelling in many? Even rarer. Ups the scale of the breeding program you need to maintain the odds of elite breeding material.

And that's disregarding the possibility for antagonisms, which could quite possibly apply in a seed vs flesh selection. The plan only has so much energy to allocate, after all.

[Raymondo]

Nick or Rowan, if either of you end up with enough small seeds to share at some point, give us a hoy. I’d love a small seeded watermelon. I’d cross it into Orangeglo, the only watermelon I’ve tried that is reliable in my short season.

[rowan]

I will definitely have some for next season ray, just remember to ask me closer to time

[Raymondo]

I will definitely have some for next season ray, just remember to ask me closer to time

Many thanks Rowan.

[Andrew Barney]

All good points. I was just pointing out that the possibility is there. In any case it's slightly off topic to this threads main objective,  so let's move on.

I too am more interested in this tiny tomato seed trait if i don't already have it, which i probably don't. I'm liking this idea more and more and think this could really take a chunk out of the traditional seedless watermelon business. Heck i feel like I've seen that in one i bought as seedless before, maybe.

Add me to the list of interested parties in getting seed from you down the line. It could make for some interesting crosses and introgressions.

[Nicholas Locke]

Ray and Andrew, I could spare 10 or so seeds for you guys If you want?
Ray, crossing to Orangeglo  sounds Interesting! I love the taste and vigour of that melon.
PM me , and If your interested in anything else let me know I might have something..

[Lauren]

I got a watermelon from a neighbor that had tiny white seeds--I thought it might be a growing problem rather than a variety. I didn't grow it and I don't know where she got it--does anyone think there might be problems with including it in my landrace?

[Andrew Barney]

I got a watermelon from a neighbor that had tiny white seeds--I thought it might be a growing problem rather than a variety. I didn't grow it and I don't know where she got it--does anyone think there might be problems with including it in my landrace?

Well i guess it depends on if the seeds were flat and undeveloped or if plump and fully developed.

True "seedless" watermelons still have seeds,  they just won't grow because of the chromosome mismatch of a tetraploid crossed with a diploid.

But otherwise, if they grow, then they should be fine. They may not be adapted to your climate necessarily but i don't see any problems other than that.

I suspect the seeds your neighbor gave you might be flat and unviable, but without more information it's hard to know for sure.

[Dominic J]

Would anyone have an idea on what impacts tiny (tomato-sized) seeds would have on growth? I'm inclined to believe that these plants would need to be sown much earlier than their large-seeded counterparts to arrive to maturity at the same time?

Also, what's the impact on mouthfeel, when eating a bunch of tiny seeds? Can't easily spit them out like large seeds, but maybe they are so small they aren't too noticeable?

[Lauren]

I suspect the seeds your neighbor gave you might be flat and unviable, but without more information it's hard to know for sure.

No, they were just like other watermelon seeds, hard and fat, just small. Viable or not is more open to question, but they just looked like tiny watermelon seeds. I'll see if I can find them (they're somewhere in one of my seed boxes lol)

[Dominic J]

Also, my apologies, I realized after that those subjects had already been brought up earlier in this very thread. Whoops, my bad.

[Olaf Nurlif]

I hope I didn't overlook anything but you guys asked (among other things) for a naked seed type watermelon, did I understand that correctly?
There is an OSSI-pledged variety with this trait if I'm not mistaken:

Egusi Papershell
Crop: Watermelon Seeds
Latin name: Citrullus lanatus var. mucosospermus
Plant Breeder: Ken Asmus, Oikos Tree Crops

It seems to be rather spicy though, that might be undesirable in a dual purpose variety ^^.
But as you already mentioned a dual purpose seed/flesh type may be possible to breed but not desirable because of several factors..

[Peter]

Olaf, what do you mean by spicy? You mean like a hot pepper?

[Andrew Barney]

Interesting. I didn't know such a variety was pledged open. Though I'm not so much interested in the Egusi trait though I might be highly interested in the other wild genetics it may possess.