Nghe An melon specialty is dried in the fields, farmers are not interested in harvesting

At the melon fields in Dien Ky commune (Dien Chau) at this time, there is no longer the image of people gathering to harvest in large numbers, traders coming to load goods onto trucks bustlingly like in previous seasons. Instead, there are melon fields "exposed" to the sun, occasionally traders come out to look at the melons, then just shake their heads and leave.

The melon field in Hamlet 2, Dien Ky Commune (Dien Chau) is in harvest season, but people have to leave the melons exposed to the sun due to pests. Photo: QA

Having just taken a break from picking up the remaining melons, Ms. Nguyen Thi Ngoc in Hamlet 2, Dien Ky Commune sighed: April is the time when people focus on harvesting spring melons. Who would have thought that this year the melons were infected with a disease, I thought each family would have an income of tens of millions of dong, but now everything is lost.

Not far away, Mr. Nguyen Van Xuan’s family also suffered from spoiled melons in the middle of the harvest season. Instead of picking melons to sell, he now has to harvest melons dumped on both sides of the road to free up land for the new crop.

The melons were severely infected and had to be destroyed in the middle of the harvest season. Photo: QA

Mr. Xuan lamented: "My family has 3 sao of melons, last year we sold them for 29 million VND, but this year we only harvested one crop and the melons were destroyed by disease. Although we tried to save them, it was ineffective."

According to the reporter's observations, the melons in Dien Ky commune all have common characteristics: small fruits are wilted, large fruits are eaten by worms in patches, the plants dry up and die, the leaves are burnt... The entire melon field has to be abandoned because there are no buyers after the harvest.

The cause of the mass disease of melons is still unclear, however, according to some melon growers, it may be due to the weather with a lot of dew, leading to pests. In addition, it may be due to the quality of the seeds, some households took seeds of unknown origin, leading to heavy losses.

According to farmers, melon seeds of unknown origin are one of the causes of pests and diseases. Photo: QA

Dien Ky is a commune with a tradition of growing melons in Dien Chau district. In this spring crop, the whole commune has 10 hectares of melons, accounting for more than half of the district's melon area, of which the area of ​​damaged melons accounts for 70%. Every year, the average yield of melons is from 8 to 10 quintals/sao, if well cared for, it can reach 12 quintals/sao; with a selling price of 12,000 - 15,000 VND/kg in the field, each sao of melons brings in an income of more than 10 million VND. However, this year, most households only earn from 3 to 5 million VND, mainly from pickled melons, many households have lost everything.

Never before have melons been affected by pests as much as this year. When pests were discovered, some households did not report them to plant protection officers but bought their own medicine to treat them based on their experience. This is one of the reasons why the disease was not cured but spread widely. We have sent disease samples to the district Plant Protection Station and at the same time advised people to harvest the remaining melons and not leave them uncultivated in the fields, which will affect the soil quality later.

Ms. Phan Thi Hien - agricultural officer of Dien Ky commune

Some lucky households with less diseased melons are focusing on harvesting to sell at high prices. Photo: QA

Currently, in addition to picking melons, people in Dien Ky commune are focusing on collecting damaged fruits, digging holes to bury them and treating them with lime powder; for plants, they are dried and burned. This is only the first melon crop of the year, so some households have already prepared the land to grow seeds for the next crop in the hope of a successful crop to make up for the losses.

Dien Ky is a commune located along National Highway 1A, famous for its fruit trees and short-term vegetables. Graphics: Lam Tung