Towlieee
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Thinning melon vines?

I made this post before, didn't get any good responses...

My melon plant has tons of vines at the base, branching all different directions.... I only have TWO melons growing. Would it help to snip and thin the other vines at soil level? Does the sun help from one vine to another?

Like I feel that the root system can only uptake so much nutrients/water, so instead of growing 10+ vines, it would be better to keep my only 2 vines intact and eradicate the rest?

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!potatoes!
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nope. the more leaves, the more energy being gathered and turned into growth of any kind (fruit included). bigger plants/more leaves means bigger fruits.

Towlieee
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!potatoes! wrote:nope. the more leaves, the more energy being gathered and turned into growth of any kind (fruit included). bigger plants/more leaves means bigger fruits.
Yeah I just wasn't sure if the extra vines brought in energy, transported it back to the base, then sent it back out to the vines that need it

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jal_ut
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I am with !potatoes!, just let them grow. Hope you get some big melons.

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!potatoes!
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Towlieee wrote:
!potatoes! wrote:Yeah I just wasn't sure if the extra vines brought in energy, transported it back to the base, then sent it back out to the vines that need it
yep. the whole plant regulates itself and gets everything where it needs to go.

Melon boy
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No I would leave all the vines and leaves intact. They all serve a purpose to feed the plant and fruit. You will see the vines and tendrils actually send roots down under moist conditions to store nutrients for fruiting later

Towlieee
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Thanks everyone for the info!

My one 'biggest' melon is almost fully ripe at this point, I'm excited to harvest it as I want my plant to put all its effort into the 1-2 melons that are now just starting to grow. My one new "hope" melon is growing like a weed, damn thing went from a marble to almost baseball size in just a few days, the vine is 13 foot long, and the melon is at around 11.5" foot on the vine.
I hand pollinated 3 melons like a week ago, I hand pollinated the Fk out of them, like 3-4 males per female flower, to make sure they set, and only this one set for sure, I MIGHT have one other one, still not sure,e its only a little bit bigger than a marble..... I'm sure I pollinated them good, so maybe its the plant regulating itself. I'm ancy to cut my biggest melon off that I'm pretty sure is almost ripe or alreayd ripe, but don't wanna cut it off early. I know once I cut it, the other melon will have all the more "resources" to help it haha

Just took this a couple minutes ago, its growing FAST! lol
Image

edit: the vine connecting this one is as big as my other bigger melons vine already.... So I have good hopes it'll finish before first frost :)

Already have a netting style bag to hang it from, will be my first "hanging" melon lol



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