One Watermelon Plant Took Over Half my Garden (It's only supposed to be 6 to 8 feet)
5 years ago in #photography by fubar-bdhr (68)
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Squashes will do this too, or any other vining plant really. The only way to control them is with more of the same. If you plant a small field of them they will just about share the space equally, but if you plant just one it will grow and grow and take up as much space as it can before first frost. 6-8 feet is the recommended spacing between columns and rows of plants. That way each plant gets big enough to absorb enough sunlight to produce fruit, but can't grow unnecessarily large without running into another.
The three I have planted elsewhere have kept relatively in the 8 foot area. They do send out a long vine here and there but nothing like this one. Those ones you can just curve the vine to control it. This one is bigger than the other 3 combined. The other 3 have plenty of space to grow too. This thing is just a monster. I'm just trying to keep it from taking over the grass.
You must have richer soil where you planted that one. There is no set genetic limit on how big these things will get. If there were it would be called "determinate", and there are tomatoes and squashes like that (well, only c. Pepo squashes AFAIK) but no watermelons as far as I'm aware.
Yea I have great soil. I get 14 foot tall cherry tomato plants too. Not sure how big my regular tomato plants would get. They tend to break the tomato stakes if they get over 7 feet.