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>> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: "Kieran &/or Donna" <holycow@frontiernet.net>
To: "North American Fruit Explorers" <nafex@lists.ibiblio.org>
Date: Sun, 4 Oct 2009 23:23:14 -0500
Subject: Re: [NAFEX] Engraved watermelons

Mark,  thanks for the amazing photo!   Looks like a disease to me too.  Do they begin to rot in concentric circles too?  Donna

The affected melons have been those the vines of which died away unbeknownst to me under the grasshopper-infested grasses that came up around the vines, and languished there some weeks after they should have been taken.  I strongly suspect the artistic sensibilities of polyphagous orthopterans.  The melons  are all firm--there is no corresponding interior rot--and I intend to eat them all.  So far, they have been normal and sweet.  The markings appear quite superficial--they are palpable tracks from which the outermost layer of pigmented skin has been mechanically removed. 
-- 
Mark Straka
Sac City, IA

Attachment: Whorl Melon 1.jpg
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Attachment: Whorl 2.jpg
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Attachment: Whorl 3.jpg
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Attachment: Whorl Eaten 4.jpg
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