Does winter melon need pinching when growing? Mastering the timing of topping is key

Winter melon is a vegetable often used for making soup, and plenty of people love eating winter melon, so does growing winter melon need pinching? Let's take a look!

1. Basic introduction to winter melon

Winter melon is an annual trailing or trellis-grown herbaceous plant of the Cucurbitaceae family and the genus Benincasa. The stems of winter melon bear yellowish-brown stiff hairs and long soft hairs. Winter melon flowers are generally solitary, the fruit is long cylindrical or nearly spherical, the fruit is fairly large, and the seeds are ovate.

The main distribution areas of winter melon are other tropical and subtropical regions of Asia, and it is cultivated in all parts of China.

Winter melon likes warmth and tolerates heat. It can grow normally within the range of 25°C-30°C, and temperatures below 20°C are detrimental to fruit development.

In addition, sufficient light must be provided during the growing period. If it rains for a long time during the fruiting period, rain protection measures should be taken, otherwise flower drop, fruit abortion and fruit rot will occur.

2. Does growing winter melon need pinching?

Yes, because if winter melon is not pinched when grown, the vines will keep growing, the nutrients will be absorbed by the vines, and the winter melons produced will be smaller with poor quality.

3. Cultivation techniques for winter melon

1. Propagation

Winter melon is generally sown in spring and autumn. The sowing times are December-March and June-July each year. In spring, seedling transplanting is mostly used, while in autumn, sprouted-seed sowing is used.

For raising seedlings, nutrient pots are generally used. The required nutrient soil must be prepared in advance. It can be made by mixing sieved fertile garden soil that has been baked and sun-dried, or burnt soil ash, decomposed pig and cattle manure residue, and rice husk ash. The volume ratio of the three is about 6:2:2. A small amount of nitrogen-phosphorus-potassium compound fertilizer can also be added, and its amount is generally controlled at 0.2%-0.3%. It is required to be finely broken up and evenly mixed.

2. Field planting

Once the melon seedlings have grown steadily, they can be transplanted. 2-3 days before planting, the seedlings can be drenched with 10% dilute human manure water and 80% zineb 800 times or 75% chlorothalonil 600 times solution, so as to transplant with fertilizer and medicine. After field planting, water and cover with plastic film.

3. Fertilizer and water management

After field planting, apply dilute manure water 2-3 times to promote rapid growth. During the vine extension stage, water thoroughly once. During the fruit-setting stage, when the fruit grows to the size of a fist, apply fruit-setting fertilizer once, with 225kg/hm2 of urea, which can be applied by infiltration irrigation under the film along with water.

After that, trellising and vine tying must also be carried out, so that winter melon can grow better.