so I have about nine sugar baby watermelon that have the signs of being ready soon (yellow soil spot, dried tendril) and so to determine if they would indeed be ready soon, i picked one of the older watermelon that had been on the vine a couple weeks before the others

this watermelon always confused me....it's tendril had been dried off for maybe a couple weeks but it never developed a yellow soil spot, so i figured i needed to let it take in more water. well even today when i picked it it still only had a brighter color of green on the bottom instead of yellow....it never got heavy but i picked it anyway because i knew i needed to see what was going on so that i could also judge my other watermelons

when i opened this one, it was a light pink inside and the white rind around it was very thick. so i thought "ahh maybe i should have let it stay on the vine even longer" but then i started eating it. it was stringy and mealy like a watermelon that should have been harvested a long time ago. it was still sweet and yummy, but stringy and mealy

so all it did was confuse me more on whether my other watermelons that are showing the "ripe" signs are ready or not.

so i'm wondering if it was over ripe and it was just a light pink with a thick rind because it was just a dud of a melon? plus when it first started growing, something had chewed a little hole into the side of it. it healed, and the outside had no discoloration or signs of sickness, so i let it keep growing. i wonder since it had a hole chewed through it and it caused the melon to deform in shape, maybe that might be why the rind was so thick? i have no idea LOL

any input would be very appreciated. thanks!