Watermelons and yellow? cucumbers...

Maybe off topic (but did use the tractor to put the garden in...).

Pics of the garden - the one with the melons and cucumbers. First pic - the watermelon close to ripe.
Second pic - a dead/rotted one on same plant. There were 2 that looked like this.
Third Pic - watermelon plant one plant over, plant starting to yellow at the base. Last pic - the cucumbers - they get about this green then go yellow. Any ideas/thoughts as to what I'm doing wrong here?

By the way, the one melon by my size 11 shoe was almost ripe when I picked it this evening, but still very very tasty and tender. Also, started all the plants in pond muck mixed in with the soil, for the pond post below. These were started as small seedlings on July 4 (due to construction of my shop).
I irrigate them from the pond too.

Thanks for the help

Tony

Go to the internet on your computer, type in
Watermelon diseases also cucumber diseases. This will answer your problems much better than
anyone else. ggp

An opinion is about all that can be tendered here.
Mellon plants know the extent to which they can produce fruit. If they start one good mellon, and the conditions are good they will produce more. (there may be many blooms) If conditions are not to their liking they may sacrifice all but one mellon to make sure they succeed with that one. Pond muck is usually very fine silty soil particles. It may need courser sand, and possibly organic material in it for best growth.
The organisms in the soil (and spores from the pond) respond well to pond water because that is "home" to them. The soil may actually need fertilizer to perform well.
The cukes are ripe just as they begin to turn yellow, or 2 days before that. Same rationale as above, but added to that is the fact that the big end little end factor, indicates to me that they might have suffered from the late planting. Plants respond to olength of day temp, and length of time in the ground. Internal clocks are not adjustable. If the late planting allowed the plants to "believe" the days were already to short and getting shorter, they might have "decided" to finish what ever fruit they had made to that point.
Were it my soil, I would mix in some green manure, maybe 2 " of non treated grass clippings, plus maybe 1.5 cu/yds of mature compost 2 cubic yards of course sand, and work toward getting it blacker. Jim

Tony,

Agree with Janicholson, the cucumbers look as if they are just doing their end of season push to "ripen and produce seed" - they do yellow when ripe. Though the large end/small end probably indicate they have been stressed.

Ripe cukes can be used to make sweet pickles called Slip Gherkins. You peel them and scrape out all the seeds, using only the meat of the cucumber.

No clue on the melons. I have never grown any.