# Seedless Watermelon Seed



## Mike CHS (Jul 23, 2019)

I was eating some Crimson Sweet Watermelon out of our garden this morning and it got me to wondering how do you get seed to plant a "seedless" Watermelon.  I had to go look it up and thought some others might be interested in one of those things that was never thought about before. 
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Seed Production.* The obvious question asked about growing seedless watermelons is: "How does one obtain seed of a seedless watermelon?" Obviously, you cannot save seed from a seedless watermelon. So, where do the seeds come from? Simply stated, the number of chromosomes (the threadlike bodies within cells that contain the inheritance units called genes) in a normal watermelon plant is doubled by the use of the chemical colchicine. Doubling a normal (diploid) watermelon results in a tetraploid plant (one having four sets of chromosomes). When the tetraploid plant is bred back, or pollinated, by a diploid or normal plant, the resulting seed produces a triploid plant that is basically a "mule" of the plant kingdom, and it produces seedless watermelons. Seed of seedless varieties are available from most major seed companies.


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## RollingAcres (Jul 23, 2019)

I'm glad I'm not the only thinking about that part. 
Thanks for sharing the info.


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## Mini Horses (Jul 23, 2019)

AND --many of the "sold as seedless" are not the mule they hoped for.    So, those seeds will not produce a seedless either.    Disappointing to cut into and "find" seeds.  They are generally soft & smaller....not even good to spit away! 

But I love having an explanation.

Speaking of MULES -- in the equine world they are 99% infertile but, a few cases are recorded of a molly mule actually producing a foal.   There's those genes at work!


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## AmberLops (Jul 23, 2019)

Very interesting! I prefer regular melons though


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