Honeydew

Sowing: Honeydew is a tender, warm-season annual raised from seed. It can be direct-sown outdoors after the danger of frost has passed, once soil has warmed to roughly 60–70°F, or started indoors three to four weeks earlier in plantable pots so the delicate roots are not disturbed at transplanting; seedlings are set out once they carry one or two true leaves. Seeds are commonly sown several to a hill or mound and later thinned to the two or three strongest plants, with hills spaced several feet apart or plants set a foot or more apart in rows five to six feet apart.

Siting and water: The vine needs full sun and fertile, well-drained soil improved with organic matter, ranging from neutral to somewhat acidic. Moisture must stay consistent and plentiful from germination through fruit set, since dry spells at germination cause poor emergence and moisture shortage at bloom leads to misshapen fruit, while excess water close to harvest can shrink fruit size and hasten vine decline.

Support: The vining plant can be left to trail along the ground or trained onto a trellis or cage, in which case the heavy ripening fruit benefits from a sling for support.

As a member of the cucumber family, honeydew is vulnerable to striped and spotted cucumber beetles, aphids, squash bugs, squash vine borers and flea beetles, along with diseases including powdery mildew, downy mildew, gummy stem blight, anthracnose, bacterial wilt, fusarium wilt, cucumber mosaic virus, fungal leaf spot and scab. Cucumber beetles are of particular concern because they can spread bacterial wilt, so growers are advised to cover young plants with fine netting or floating row cover from planting until flowering, then remove the cover to allow pollination. Spacing plants to improve air circulation, avoiding wetting the foliage, clearing fallen diseased leaves and fruit in autumn, and rotating cucurbit crops out of the same soil each year all help limit these recurring problems.

Honeydew belongs to the Inodorus group, whose fruit does not detach cleanly from the stem at maturity the way a cantaloupe slips free; ripeness must instead be judged from other cues rather than the fruit separating on its own. Melons in this group are generally later-maturing and longer-keeping than netted cantaloupes, a trait that has earned Inodorus types the description of "winter melons" valued for their storage life.

Culinary: Honeydew is grown for its edible fruit, eaten fresh on its own, wrapped in prosciutto, added to salads, or served as a dessert, with a flavor described as watery but delicate. The seeds are best avoided, since the sprouting seed produces a toxic substance in its embryo.

The wild ancestors of Cucumis melo originated in Africa, with the crop's domestication dated to roughly 3,000 years ago before it evolved and separated into two subspecies, C. melo agrestis and C. melo inodorus, the latter being the lineage to which honeydew belongs. Archaeological remains show the species reaching China by about 5,000 years ago and Egypt and Iran during the second and third millennia BC, and some molecular phylogenetic evidence points to an origin in India, with the melon later carried to the New World by Columbus and further west by Spanish settlers.