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formerly RGG

My theory is that seed color is determined by the mother plant and is the equivalent of the placenta in an animal as that is also part of the mother and coats and protects the young. I think if seed color were determined by the male, in a open pollination there would be a chance for different colored seeds within the same melon and I have never seen that. So have any of you growers ever seen two different seed colors in a open pollinated melon? I mean not to include the white non viable seeds that can be observed in nearly every watermelon.

9/18/2011 7:05:38 PM

Bowdon, GA

Seed color still puzzles me Dennis, All of mine were brown this year except one grown from the 264 Kent X 255 Mitchell. 291X268 was brown, 255X113Kent brown, 113X291 brown. So brown+brown equaled brown, white+brown equaled white, brown+white equaled brown. But get this last year I had a brown + brown turned out white?

9/18/2011 10:11:53 PM

sevierville, Tn

Jake, thats interesting.
The 255 in the past have always given brown seeds for me.
264= still growing.
291= gave me white seeds, the melon was only 25 days so they may have turned but the seeds were mature.
113=last year they were white(264) crossed with 178mudd(white)

9/18/2011 10:45:07 PM

formerly RGG

Sorry for my ignorance, I should have said the amniotic sac instead of the placenta.

9/18/2011 10:47:36 PM

formerly RGG

Jake,that's very interesting. Sounds like it may be impossible to predetermine seed color.

9/18/2011 10:53:11 PM

Reelfoot Lake, Tennessee

An article on Crimson Sweet watermelon seed coloring---this is slightly off topic and likely old hat to most of you, but there is an interesting article on melon seed coat coloring by a member of the faculty of a prominent Turkish ag. university and published by a Czech organization.
the url is: agriculturejournals.cz/publicFiles/19957.pdf
He put the seeds thru a battery of tests and concluded that "brown" seeds were the best and most vigorous.
Regards, Clutch

9/18/2011 11:07:42 PM

Bowdon, GA

Hey Chris two years ago I had 2 255's. One 194lbs and one 191lbs both open pollinated. The 194 was white and the 191 was brown. Only two plants in the patch had males at that time. The 255 and the 197 Mudd (white). I assumed the 197 must have pollinated the 194, and the 191 was selfed but who knows?

9/18/2011 11:45:35 PM

Bowdon, GA

I might add that I had seed melons that I culled from each plant that where the same crosses as the bigones this year. All of the seed melons matched there bigger counter parts as far as seed color. Alot of the 30-40lb seed melons had fully developed brown seeds in them. I tried to pollinated the 268 with the 264 both white but couldn't get a hand pollinated one to set on that plant.

9/18/2011 11:53:43 PM

Bowdon, GA

Chris was the 285 Edwards white seeded? That was the pollinator right?

9/18/2011 11:58:09 PM

Muddy Waters

The 285dmg is white.I just take a sharpie & makem whatever color I like,MaMa always said it was ok!

9/19/2011 6:17:30 AM

sevierville, Tn

I quoted wrong on the 255, 1st year was white, last year was brown. The mother determines seed color, otherwise open pollinated would have different color seeds.

Which brings up the question as to why do we get different seed color from the same seed ????
It would have to be genetic

9/19/2011 3:08:58 PM

sevierville, Tn

That should have said "from the same seed line"

9/19/2011 3:09:48 PM

formerly RGG

Chris, I can understand different seed color from seeds from the same melon if the melon was open pollinated. If you are talking a closed pollination then I don't understand.

9/19/2011 3:13:35 PM

Trinity River Bottom

I opened my 267 Edwards that was selfed, yesterday they were brown .. the 267 Edwards seed were brown and it was grown from the 255 Mitchell.Which were also brown.

9/19/2011 3:38:28 PM

Corryton, TN

Jake, were the color combinations you gave, the seed color you planted or the color of the seeds in the melons that were crossed?

9/19/2011 5:29:59 PM

Corryton, TN

Re-read it, I got it.

9/19/2011 5:38:35 PM

Corryton, TN

My question is, has anyone crossed a vine that produced a white seeded melon with a vine that produced a white seeded melon and got brown seeds from the resulting off-spring?

If not I think I can explain it. If so, I give up and I'll still plant from the ones that I think can break 300!!!

9/19/2011 5:45:24 PM

Bowdon, GA

I haven't had a white, white=brown. Explain away Dave LOL. Something I wondered, this maybe a dumb question but. The Brown Brown= White cross I made, lets say all of the parents and grandparents were brown seeded except the 157 Bright. The white seed trait showing back up does that mean the offspring of my cross may show characteristics of the 157.

9/19/2011 6:15:27 PM

Bowdon, GA

Well that wouldn't make sense because Chris is probablly right about the mother determining color. Clear us up Bro Dave

9/19/2011 6:19:02 PM

Bowdon, GA

I guess I'm determined to make this a complicated as possible,LOL But last year I played around with some Mountain Hoosiers in a seperate patch. They had been crossed with carolinas. The seeds I planted were black seeds. One of them looked like a mix between a MH and a CC. It was crossed back to the 259 Kent. The seeds turned out black. The other melon looked like a really big black diamond. I selfed it to try to preserve the color. The seeds in it were brown like a CC. Didn't expect that. I didn't have time to plant it this year but would be interesting to see what the offspring looked like.

9/19/2011 6:35:39 PM

Corryton, TN

Disclaimer:::: My theory only!

Brown is dominate. White is recessive. You can not tell only by looking at the seed what it will produce. Let's use, B = brown gene, w = white gene. Every plant carries two genes for color and there are 4 possible combinations of these two genes: BB, Bw, wB, ww. BB, Bw and wB plants will always produce brown seeded fruit. ww will always produce white seeded fruit. The following crosses are possible.
Remember only 1 gene from each parent goes into this years melon.
BB x ww = Bw or Bw = 100% brown seeded fruit
BB x Bw = BB or Bw = 100% brown
BB x wB = Bw or BB = 100% brown
BB x BB = BB or BB = 100% brown

more to follow

BB

9/19/2011 7:31:47 PM

Corryton, TN

I know I didn't show all the combinations in detail above but they would look the same. Here I nee too.
Bw x BB = BB or BB or wB or wB = 100% brown seeded fruit
Bw x Bw = BB or Bw or wB or ww = 75% brown seeded fruit & 25% white
Bw x wB = Same as line above
Bw x ww = Bw or Bw or ww or ww = 50% brown & 50% white

Rest after supper!

9/19/2011 7:43:49 PM

Garner, NC

Ok, dumb question. Does it really matter what color the seed is or do you what to know for a gentic stand point which genes are carried over to the seed.

9/19/2011 7:47:39 PM

Corryton, TN

Nothing comes between me and corned beef & cabbage.

wB cross results are the same as the last post

ww x BB = wB or wB or wB or wB = 100% brown
ww x Bw = wB or ww or wB or ww = 50/50
ww x wB = same as line above
ww x ww = ww or ww or ww or ww

There it is. This is base on Simple Mendelian Genetics with the assumption there is only one gene controling seed color. Repeat: I have no idea if I'm right!

9/19/2011 8:15:31 PM

Corryton, TN

Ice, at this point I can't see where it could be a factor at all. Any seed that can grow a monster is fine with me. Seed color seems to come up quite often and I'm just trying clear up how it MIGHT be controled. I think it comes up because most of us saw dark seeds as kids and I was always told the white ones were bad seeds. I believed it until I tried CC's.

9/19/2011 8:27:07 PM

Seed color in watermelons is kinda complicated. It involves genetic material at three different sites with two possibilities at each site. Apparently there is some blending of effects also. The effects of some of the genes seem to vary with the variety of watermelon. Seed color seems to have no effect on overall size of the fruit but it does matter if your contest is one that requires a certain seed color. As I understand, there is at least one major contest where the winning melon is checked for seed color.

9/19/2011 8:58:54 PM

formerly RGG

It doesn't seem fair that a melon could be disqualified because of it's seed color.I am all for growing whichever seed produces the largest melons and I am fairly certain one color has not been proven to grow larger melons than another color. I remember reading one of the original cultivars was Cobb Gem. I assume one of the original cultivars that crossed to create the Carolina Cross was black seeded and the other cultivar was white seeded. Anyone know if I am correct ?

9/19/2011 9:32:13 PM

formerly RGG

Lloyd, thanks for the input. You probably know as much or more about this subject as anyone else.

9/19/2011 9:34:16 PM

Bowdon, GA

Thanks Dave and Lloyd,

9/20/2011 12:00:42 AM