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Planting
Days to maturity
Seasonal yields
Sow indoors · Direct sow · Transplant outdoors
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Plant · P-345
Cucamelon
Melothria scabra
Cucamelon vines produce grape-sized fruit that taste like cucumber with a citrus tang, eaten raw or pickled straight off the plant. It is a fast, heavy-fruiting vine best grown on a trellis rather than left to sprawl, and it flowers yellow through the hottest part of summer, when there is little else blooming for pollinators. A wild relative in the same genus survives as a perennial, so there is a real chance the below-ground tuber can survive a mild winter and resprout - worth mulching over and finding out.
Record at a glance
Growing profile
- Sun
- Full Sun
- USDA zone
- USDA 2–11
- Soil
- Sand · Loam
- Moisture
- Well-Drained · Moderate
Vertical layer
Vine- Soil pH
- 6–6.8
- Plant type
- Annual
- Mature height
- 10–12 ft
- Mature spread
- 2–4 ft
- Plant spacing
- 24 in
- Root type
- Tap
- Spread pattern
- Seed
Keep exploring
Similar plants
Discover more plants with shared forest layers or growing conditions.
Achocha
Cyclanthera pedata
Achocha is a fast climbing vine that gives three edible parts off one plant - young fruit eaten raw or cooked with a cucumber flavor, mature…
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African Walnut
Plukenetia conophora
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Air Potato
Dioscorea bulbifera
Air Potato is a true perennial vine that produces edible bulbils in its leaf axils along with an underground tuber - unlike frost-killed…
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Akebia
Akebia quinata
Akebia is a fast-growing twining vine from East Asian mountain woodland that tolerates full shade better than almost any other fruiting…
Vine · USDA 5–8
Amur Grape
Vitis amurensis
Amur Grape is a cold-hardy climbing vine, native to the woodlands of Russia, China, Korea and Japan, that survives temperatures down to about…
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Arctic Kiwi
Actinidia kolomikta
Arctic Kiwi is the hardiest of the edible kiwi vines, a twining climber from cold parts of eastern Asia that survives dormant winters to…
Vine · USDA 4–8
The deeper layer
Plan what comes next.
- Primary
- Locked ecological function
- Secondary
- Locked ecological function
- Byproduct
- Locked ecological function
Behind the record
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