All right folks, we're launching meat eaters biggest giveaway ever the biggest giveaway in the history of of us
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So we got over $17,000 worth of prizes
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A chance to come with friends to our bows and Montana headquarters and our brand spickity new
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And me and in some of the crew chester will you help
Chester who's sitting here just doing not even nothing to do with what I'm doing right now
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Um
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Sucking bison tail meat out of your teeth
Welcome to this country life
I'm your host Brent Reaves
From cone hunting to trot lining and just general country living
I want you to stay a while as I share my stories and country skills that will help you beat the system
This country life is proudly presented as part of meat eater's podcast network
Bringing you the best outdoor podcast the airways have to offer
All right friends pull you up a chair or drop that tailgate. I think I got a thing or two to teach you
Watermelons
It's watermelon time and I live in watermelon country judging by a little research that I did a whole bunch of us do
Now where I live you can't chunk a yard dart in the air this time of year
And not have it come down and stab a watermelon or somebody eating one
So this week as we continue to celebrate the
247th year of our nation telling England to kiss our behind
We're going to talk about three different varieties how to pick a ripe one
Salt or no salt why is that even a question and seedless watermelons what kind of witchcraft is that
Hang on to the end and you're going to get some bonus footage first. I'm going to tell you a story
I think about some things and I ponder about others
The difference in my thinking and pondering is when I think about algebra, which is seldom
I'm forced to ponder about who decided their fractions weren't hard enough without adding letters to them
Adding letters together is called spelling not math now what in the world does algebra have to do with watermelons
Not one thing
It's the issue of pondering so in the grand scheme of things is stealing a watermelon to crime
Well the answer is an obvious yes of course it is
But to a couple of high school boys that looked a whole lot like me in one of my lifelong best friends Greg Hades
We decided the risk was worth the reward
I believe the mere thought of the sweet nectar of the watermelon is the catalyst that entice two young boys to demonstrate
Lawlessness and mayhem
I admit it. I'm a watermelon addict and I always have been
There was a local farmer not far from town that grew some of the best watermelons in the county
No different were of these melons than the ones that we grew in our farm
So why would I be stealing watermelons when we had them at at home?
You ask well, that's a good question and it brings me back to that pondering thing
Regardless this man raised a lot of tomatoes peas corn beans and cows just like we did he was a very nice man
And he could have killed me and Greg one night and we're both glad he didn't
The second night of the watermelon pillage and started out all right
The farmer's watermelon patch had provided a couple of sweet offerings on the previous night till a couple of boys that were
hanging around with their friends uptown with nothing better to do
It seemed only prudent that we should return for another sampling
Mean Greg could just roll a couple of mediums up to the fence next to the road where he said
Look at that watermelon up yonder under that night light
Sweet mother it was huge. It was a perfect specimen of a watermelon
It looked like it weighed 50 pounds. It was one of the biggest black diamond watermelons I'd ever seen in my life
I'm not sure that that light shining upon it wasn't coming from heaven instead of the night light
And what of this night light and huge watermelon that lay beneath it
How could something that is so blatantly obvious now not look like the huge rat trap that it was then
Now I can see me and Greg rolling back up to the cool side of the sun and driving in with this monster
Where we would gather folks up and share our sweet ill gotten gain
It was 10 o'clock and the farmer was no doubt in bed
None the wiser to the hooliganism that was taking place a quarter mile from his house next to his barn
Under that big night light
We ease up to the watermelon that all future watermelons would come to be judged
And gently caressed its cool dark skin my mind was racing
My heart was racing
And all of a sudden
Greg was racing
Greg was racing
When the world's he going
I was confused so I'm not sure if I was wandering or pondering at this point
I stood there and I watched him cover the 150 yards of watermelon patch and what seemed like five seconds
Now Greg was built for speed and he held the state record high jump for quite a while
And with one fluid motion
He jumped that five strand bob wire fence that we had crawled under just a few minutes before
I heard him when he hit the gravel road on the other side
The sound of his shoes on that gravel sounded like an antique stopwatch as he
And the racket his feet were making faded into the dark night out of sight and out of here
Then just as that night light had bathed that black diamond and glow and glory I had an epiphany
Maybe something was wrong
Maybe Greg was running because he was scared of something
While I looked around on the ground maybe it was a snake
Maybe it was a dog I didn't see
Maybe it was that man standing in the hall of that barn holding the shot good. Yep, that's probably it
I commence to put this much distance between myself and the business end of that shot gun as I could
As a good lord allowed me to do
I got to that fence and successfully hurtled four of the five strings
The fifth one tore the left leg almost completely out of my overall
I had never run that fast in my life and up to that point I had never had
And when the nice old farmer uncorked a couple of shots that I soon were directly at me
But I'm sure now they weren't
I found a hidden gear that I didn't know I had and I could have really used it crossing that fence
Anyway, I bet that farmer told that story many times and I would have loved to have watched it from his perspective
He taught me a lesson
If it looks too good to be true, you better believe it is
But at least we'd gotten away without being identified no harm
No foul
Lesson learned
Greg and I worked at the co-op the local farm store together after schooling in the summertime
And prior to the incident we had always loaded that farmer's feet and stuff when he came as fast as we could
And would stop what we were doing to do it because we thought so much of him
A few days after that incident the store manager called Greg and I to his office saying
Someone didn't left us something
We went up front and there set that watermelon that we tried to steal a few nights before
We didn't know what to say we just stood there staring
Expecting the police to show up to fingerprint us and haul us off to prison
Store manager called the farmer by name and said he said to tell you boys
Thank you for always taking care of him and anytime you want to watermelon
Just come by and get one
He used to go to bed about 10 30
Now now I knew he wanted us to know that he called us
He knew who we were he knew we were good boys and he wasn't mad
And the lesson we learned a few nights before was cemented with that revelation
Like I said he was a real nice man
And that's just how that happened
You
What the rush brings Oklahoma weather for Texas green river Utah
Beards town Illinois Naples Texas cordale Georgia and hope Arkansas all have in common
They each call themselves the watermelon capital of the world
Now instead of us laying these places out all side by side and comparing the measurables of each claim of
Qualifications and getting folks stirred up enough to start duking it out
We're just going to cut through that waste of time and declare hope as the real champion
Hope is located in the natural state of Arkansas and it's only a coincidence that that's where I'm from and live
This was an unbiased culmination of thought and research
Based on it's a shorter drive for someone from hope to catch me out somewhere and invite me to join them in some pugilistic endeavor
Remember kids discretion is the better part of valor
Now y'all know I'm kidding not really and I seriously doubt that I could tell the difference
Yes, I could between a watermelon grown in hope as compared to one in Beards town
And I'd hate for the folks to send me free watermelons
No, I wouldn't from those places for me to try
But what kind of watermelon did y'all know there are over 300 types of watermelons?
That's right 300
Now my mind there's only two kinds of watermelon
Those I have it and those I'm fixing to
To me they're all good, but just like a lot of things
Some are just better than others
We raised Charleston grays which are very sweet and the outside is a light green color
The jubilee variety were another type that we grew and are probably what a lot of folks identify as
What a watermelon looks like with the light and the dark green stripes
They're all sweet, but my favorite has always been the black diamond
Just a few minutes ago
I related how my black diamond watermelon obsession nearly sent me and my buddy Greg
On a lifelong crime spree that could have started that very night
Had we not been shocked back into reality by a bob wire fence and a double barrel shotgun
And my mama was partial to yellow-meeted watermelons
It's been said that they're even sweeter and can have a hint of a honey flavor
I've had them both and I really couldn't testify to that, but man they're good
Yellow or red watermelons originated on the dark continent and have been around for five thousand years
That makes me kind of sad thinking about all the ones I missed
Instead of diving into all 300 plus different varieties
Let's talk briefly about the three I mentioned
They seem to be the most popular in my vast personal experience that I've had eaten them
And the minimal amount of research I did in preparation for this episode
Now don't mean I was slack and off
But these three are like the biscuits of the watermelon world to me and the rest well, they're just degraded
Developed by the US Department of Agriculture and you guessed Charleston, South Carolina
A coastal city where a reported smallpox outbreak erupted in 1698
Followed by an earthquake in 1699 those folks couldn't catch a break
But they held on until the late 1940s when gray came along
And it was love at first bite
I would like to point out the fact that while we were fresh from taking Germany and Japan out behind the woods
Shit and teaching them how to play well with others and instead of setting on our collective behinds and taking a break
We got busy making watermelons
The goal in creating Charleston Gray was to make a more diseased resistant variety and by the 1950s
It had become the most popular grown watermelon both commercially and then found this garden in the nation
Mission accomplished
Did I mention that watermelon is good for you? Check this out
Watermelons are one of the healthiest fruits you can eat
They're low calorie and a great source of vitamins A, B6 and C
Which helps strengthen your immune system and your brain function and that ain't never hurt nobody
They're also made up of more than 90% water so they'll help keep you hydrated and refreshed during the hot summertime
I recommend stretching after eating a big bait of them especially if it's just before retiring for the evening
If you stretch your legs good you're not as liable to pull the muscle jumping up in the middle of the night to hit the litter box before you wet the bed
They don't call them peach hunks for nothing
Then there's Leesburg, Florida. It was 1963 and those boys just down the road at Cape Canaveral
We're snatching up all the good press because all the talk was about going to the moon
Meanwhile the good folks at the Florida Agricultural Experiment Station were celebrating the development of the Jubilee watermelon
Described as deliciously sweet and bumping the scales at 40 pounds the Jubilee would take your taste buds out of this world
And you never had to leave the planet
This brings us to my favorite and I'm ashamed to say that when I sat down to gather up the information for this episode
And I listed my three favorite varieties
The first two in no particular order, but I knew I would end the list with this one
That I was totally unaware that a fella by the name of Melville Dylan developed a black diamond water melon in the great state of Arkansas
I kid you not I had no clue
The thing about them is they can get to a hundred pounds and be just as sweet and good as one way in 15
I'm sure that and the relationship of us growing them is what makes them my favorite because I honestly doubt
I could tell the difference in a blindfold taste test between the three of them
Now Clayton Newcomer and I were on a recent trip down to Mississippi and on the way home
We got to talking about this episode and Clay told me and I quote
It is my goal during watermelon season to eat one every day
I felt this
I told him about a five-day period last summer that Alexis and I ate four whole ones by ourselves
It was what we did every day when we got home from work go to the back patio cut the fan on and bust a watermelon
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At
An earlier point of clay bull's existence and before he became the bear grease guru
He told me about working in the produce section of Walmart and he claims to be a connoisseur of watermelons
He says he can identify and differentiate the sound of a ripe watermelon as good or better than anyone else
I like to think that I can do that too
But it was his passionate dissertation on the subtle nuances of that sounds that they make when
Thump that he made me realize that my brother of the bear was playing on the different levels in the rest of us
He is without a doubt a tear one watermelon thumper
So what's the best way to tell phones ripe
Do the old thump test
But you need to know what you're listening for
The best way I can describe what clay said is to listen for a deep resonating sound when you thump it
If it's a dull third with no resonance that jokers probably too ripe and that means merely
And when they get merely you take a bite of it and it's like having a
My mouth full of semi sweet fine ground corn meal. It is not pleasurable
If the sound is more high pitched then it's not ready yet
If you're absolutely doing this on your own it might take you a few to get the hang of it
But you will
If the thumpen doesn't do it for you then you find the field spot of where it was sitting on the ground
On the bottom is part of the watermelon that was that was in the dirt
A ripen will have a butter colored yellow field spot one does not ready yet
Will be much lighter in color or even white the skin should be firm and not the least bit much
He or soft that watermelon is ready for the compost
We talked about all of that on our ride the other day
And I sat in awe of his tails of watermelon knowledge until he told me he put salt on it
Hmm
Me I'm not bold enough to tell the folks from Charleston, South Carolina
Leaseburg, Florida or most especially our very own arcans and brother
Melville, Dylan that what they made wasn't good enough
But I could fix it I simply add in salt no sir not me
So why don't people do it? Well
People say sprinkling watermelon with salt is traditionally a southern thing like we ain't getting blamed for enough stuff already
Supposedly the opposing flavor brings out the sweetness of a fresh watermelon and somehow it makes it taste even sweeter
I'm gonna have to ponder on that
But some folks will like it that way and that's cool
Just don't salt the whole thing before we start eating
That could cause some consequences and repercussions just share it and let everyone have it the way they want it
But man if there was ever a food that was meant to be shared it's a watermelon
I went coon hunting a few nights ago on the 4th of july with my friends Michael Roseman and no old good one
Just an unplanned Arkansas summer coon hunt when we caught the nighttime temperature below 90 degrees
loaded the dogs and an hour later
We was standing in the white river bottom sweating spraying a skeet of dope on one another and wishing it was fall
The dogs were struggling to find a track because the banditos don't stir much when it's hot either
And we were all rethinking our decision to go hunting
And then I pulled out a medium sized watermelon out of brown in the drink cooler that I didn't tell them about and it was all smiles
Michael said I don't care if these dogs do tree we've been to eat this watermelon and we did and it was cold and it was good and it was seedless
So where in the world did that come from?
Well, I'll tell you
The trick is they crossed two watermelons that are genetically different enough that the resultant
Hybrid seed is sterile
So the seeds created by the cross or real seeds
But they grow into plants that cannot produce their own seed
Does that sound familiar? Well, if you're a bear grease follower of any measure it out to
What these folks are doing are making watermelon mules
Now I know I don't went from the garden to the barn, but stay with me
Mules don't make mules
Across between a female horse and a male donkey makes a mule
Mules can do lots of things, but they can't make more mules
So by crossing a horse and a donkey two separate sets of genes that are
Similar enough to be compatible, but not actually the same
We get an animal whose reproductive parts are sterile
Seedless grapes made the same way
Different species of grapes are crossed to create a mule grape which has no seeds
But seedless grapes are easy to reproduce because once you have one plant
You can just take the cuttings off of it to plant and make some more
Watermelons
Not so fast my friend
They ain't as easy because you have to produce new hybrid seeds every year
And there's only one species of watermelon to use for the crosses
To get two kinds of watermelons that are nearly but not quite
Genetically compatible the trick is to change the number of chromosomes in one of them
And because I know that there's some folks right now that want to hear how it's done
I'm going to tell you the rest of y'all just hang on just a little bit longer
You're going to learn something to impress your friends and intimidate your animals
Since 1937 plant scientists have been able to double the number of chromosomes in a plant
By treating them during sale division with a chemical called
Culture scene
Culture scene is a natural extract from the autumn crocus flower which has been used as a natural medicine for gout for thousands of years
Normal watermelons have two copies of their chromosomes in each sale
They're called dieploid
The culture scene treatment doubles that from 22 to 44 and that's called tetraploid
Almost done y'all don't fail me now here's the trick
When the tetraploid watermelon flower is pollinated with the dieploid watermelon flower
A triploid watermelon is created that has three chromosomes in each sale
This watermelon will have seeds that will grow to be seedless mule watermelons
Now that made my head hurt but now I know and you do too
You don't see folks gather enough to eat tomatoes unless there's bacon and bread close
strawberries
They're great, but again
Pull one of them out and cut it in half and it's doubtful you get a second look
But try that with a watermelon and just see how long it takes for the folks to gather up and socialize
It could also just make you want to invite folks in to share
And I'm going to share a special memory of mine as a reward for those of you that live through that seedless watermelon explanation
One summer day my dad and I were headed home from his work
We'd been all over south east Arkansas that day visiting commercial chicken farms
Now he isn't his title for the job that he did for Valmac
The company that would eventually be acquired by a couple of different corporations before
Finally becoming Tyson Foods was service man
It was his job to drive to all the contract chicken farms and his assigned area and helped the farmers produce the best chickens they could
If they needed to update equipment
A batch of medicated feed or anything related to raising good chickens
It was his job to communicate that to the farmer
Now I didn't know that I didn't work for him too because in the summer I was right there in a truck with him
Somewhere along the way on our visits to one of the many farms somebody had given us a watermelon
It was a black diamond our favorite a big dark emerald green giant of a watermelon
And I couldn't wait to get home so we could bust it wide open
Now less than two miles from our house we passed the home Mr. Julius Robinson
Mr. Julius was retired and had been for as long as I could remember
He was retired from what I assumed because I don't know what had been a lifetime of farm work or in the logwoods
Or in one of the timber mills which is what the majority of folks did in that area
Small truck farms and anything related to the hard labor end of the timber industry was the biggest employer
It was hard work, but people were happy. I'm seeing them make it all right
They raised crops youngins went to church and visited with one another
He was born in 1902 when Teddy Roosevelt was president and nine years before the Chevrolet brothers got together in Detroit, Michigan
To start the company that would eventually build the truck that he was sitting on
And on this day when we passed Mr. Julius house
He was sitting there where I'd seen him sitting a million times before
His old blue truck sat in the carport with the end gate down and nine times out of 10 when you drove by
There sat Mr. Julius gently swinging his feet and waving it folks when they passed
He always wore overalls and long sleeve shirts button to the neck regardless of the weather
We had the windows rolled down and I guess me hanging out of it waving caught my dad's attention
He said, what are you doing? I said, I'm waving at Mr. Julius
Well, no sooner than I said that and dad slowed down and as he was turning around in the road
He said, let's go share this watermelon with him
We pulled up in the shade of a huge red oak that's been gone now for years
And I ran and I hopped up on the tailgate beside him. He was smiling ear to ear
We always saw him there, but we rarely saw him with anyone
He patted me on the knee and said that what you fellas doing
But dad came around behind the truck and said, Julius, you want some of this and he said, I sure do buddy
And we sat there and I listened to them talk about that country
Old times in our people and we ate watermelon
They both talked to me and included me in the conversation
Mr. Julius knew my grandfather a man that
My dad hadn't really known
He'd been killed in a work related accident in 1943
After going to California to build Navy ships and support of the war effort and my dad was only six years old
We spent most of the afternoon there just talking long after that watermelon was gone
We stopped by a few more times until Mr. Julius didn't live there anymore
He passed away 23 years ago and his wife Nancy
32 years before that and because of my dad's random idea of wanting to share a watermelon with a lonely neighbor
I got to have a wonderful memory in another connection to my family's past
It didn't matter that we weren't related or that we didn't look alive
All that mattered was the connection of three generations the country folks shared that afternoon in the shade of that oak tree
Seems like they're ain't near enough of watermelon share and going on these days, but I bet it's more than we think
So your challenge is this go to the farmer's mark roadside stand or a grocery store and get to watermelon
Take one home and enjoy it with your family and friends the other one
Put it in your truck and start driving
One thanks for sure
You'll never see your Mr. Julius until you start looking for it
I sure enjoy telling you all these stories if you enjoy I'm please share them with your friends
And if you get a chance leave this country life a review
I don't know the math that goes into that, but it definitely helps spread the word
I'm sure it's number of fractions and letters
Hey keep yourself away from the watermelon. This is Brent Reeves signing off
y'all be careful
you
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