Muskmelon? or what?

[Paddy]

Hybrids
you won't do that again. Interesting looking though. Likely would cook up like a squash

 

[MossRoad]

Another little wrinkle here. I thought she got them at Walmart or Tractor Supply so I grilled her about it.

She and I really liked the cantaloupe from last year so she took the seeds from them and dried them. She planted those seeds, she tells me. Last year the cantaloupe were perfectly round and looked like the ones you see in a grocery store.
I don't know what to think other than maybe jeff9366 is right. I guess time will tell.

Like others have said, if last year's cantaloupe was a hybrid, saving seeds from it and planting them won't get you the same plant this year. Any idea what variety was planted last year?

 

[DFB]

Interesting comment but it could have just been cross pollinated too

 

[2LaneCruzer]

View attachment 432285View attachment 432284

My wife planted a few seeds from a muskmelon pack, but this is what is coming up. Do you have any idea what this is? It almost looks like a squash, but I don't know what to do with it at harvest time.

Thanks

If that's the vine in the background, it looks exactly like a squash plant...enough so that I would say that it has to be a squash of some kind...and the fruit looks like a squash also, or perhaps a gourd. I would say it's entirely possible that a squash seed got mixed in amongst your muskmelon seeds.

 

[Deere Dude]

We didn't plant any hybrids, just the normal seed we could get at Walmart or TSC, even though they probably sell hybrids also.

I think it is three muskmelon plants in the same vicinity and all the fruits look like that one I am holding but maybe smaller. The vines directly to the rear of the picture are watermelon vines and then back farther are some buttercup squash and cucumber plants.

We only planted muskmelons once before and that was last year and she tells me those are the seeds she used. I don't remember what the plants looked like last year, but the leaves of this think look almost like squash. Guess I will have to wait and see.

 

[OldMcDonald]

If last year's plants were not hybrids, then for the seed to come true, it would have been necessary for the melon from which the seeds came to have been crossed with the same variety. The female flower (last year) had to be fertilised with something in order to produce the fruit. Any other curcubit within a few hundred feet, or even further away, could have produced the pollen. Same this year, of course, and seeds from this year will probably produce something even different for next year. Go on, save some and give it a go. You could even start a trend on TBN - who can grow the weirdest cucurbit.

RobertBrown's suggestion of what I know as a choko (Australia) looks feasible, but your wife would have to have sown seeds from one, and I am not going to even remotely hint that she might be wrong about sowing the seeds from one of last year's melons. I never disagree with somebody else's wife. I do disagree with my one on frequent occasions.

 

[DFB]

Dang those cucurbits...get around just like an ol' tomcat

 

[2LaneCruzer]

Different varieties of squash will cross pollinate, and different varieties of melons will cross pollinate...but squash and melons will not cross pollinate. I still say it was probably a stray squash seed(s) that made their way into the bed somehow.

Cross-pollination Between Vine Crops | Horticulture and Home Pest News

 

[Deere Dude]

If last year's plants were not hybrids, then for the seed to come true, it would have been necessary for the melon from which the seeds came to have been crossed with the same variety. The female flower (last year) had to be fertilised with something in order to produce the fruit. Any other curcubit within a few hundred feet, or even further away, could have produced the pollen. Same this year, of course, and seeds from this year will probably produce something even different for next year. Go on, save some and give it a go. You could even start a trend on TBN - who can grow the weirdest cucurbit.

RobertBrown's suggestion of what I know as a choko (Australia) looks feasible, but your wife would have to have sown seeds from one, and I am not going to even remotely hint that she might be wrong about sowing the seeds from one of last year's melons. I never disagree with somebody else's wife. I do disagree with my one on frequent occasions.

I don't want her to use old seeds, but she is very frugal, so what she wants she gets. That might change next year. I never thought about cross pollinating happening. Maybe I will have a squash shaped muskmelon.

 

[Deere Dude]

Different varieties of squash will cross pollinate, and different varieties of melons will cross pollinate...but squash and melons will not cross pollinate. I still say it was probably a stray squash seed(s) that made their way into the bed somehow.

Cross-pollination Between Vine Crops | Horticulture and Home Pest News

The problem with that is we never saw those kinds of plants before, or even close to that and now we got three nice healthy plants with some odd thing growing. We will see after a month or so when I cut one open.