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Fa aers enioy bountiful crop of sweet cantaloupes, veggies <br />The Pueblo Chieftain Online <br />Select file then print to print this article. <br />Publish Date Sunday August 19, 2001 <br />Harvest time <br />Chieftain photo by Mike Sweeney <br />Watermelon, cantaloupe and other fresh produce <br />are nearing peak season at the Vic Mauro produce <br />stand near Vineland. <br />http://www.chieftain.com/print.php3?story=8 <br />Farmers enjoy bountiful crop of sweet cantaloupes, veggies <br />By MARY JEAN PORTER <br />The Pueblo Chieftain <br />It's a good summer for growing vegetables in the Arkansas Valley. <br />And it's an especially good time to be growing cantaloupe, said Mike Bartolo, vegetable crops specialist <br />at the Arkansas Valley Research Center at Rocky Ford. "The sugar is very high in the melons. This hot, <br />dry weather has been good for the cantaloupe. When there are nice sunny days and dry weather, they <br />accumulate more sugar. It's the change in temperature between day and night, the fluctuation, that causes <br />sucrose to accumulate in the fruit." <br />Bartolo said a little more than 1,000 acres of cantaloupe are being grown in the Rocky Ford area and in <br />eastern Pueblo County, nearly all of them varieties of what he called the "western shipping type." <br />"This type has a little firmer texture, a firm outer shell. A few people grow muskmelons, but those are <br />different. A muskmelon is bigger and softer, and it has sutures like a pumpkin or like the longitude lines <br />on a globe." <br />Most of the melons were planted in mid -May, and got a good start despite a big windstorm. <br />"It hurt some of the crops, but the melons have the capacity to fill out by vining. They like it fairly warm <br />and dry - they actually do quite well for water. They are a desert crop and don't require a lot of water." <br />1 of 3 8/21/01 1:26 PM <br />