Square watermelons were invented by the Japanese forty years ago. More precisely, not square, but cubic. No, they did not receive the Nobel Prize in Biology for their discovery. And genetic engineering with selection has nothing to do with it. Tricksters guessed to enclose a growing watermelon in a transparent container so that, growing, the fruit would take its shape. So you can grow not only square watermelons, but also cylindrical zucchini, and eggplants in the form of a tetrahedron, if such a need arises.
What was the need for growing watermelons of an unusual shape? The reason for this is the high cost of retail space in Japanese cities. How are these two things related? Yes, very simple.
Overpopulation of Japanese megacities has caused the high cost of not only housing, but also of any premises - industrial, office, commercial. Owners of shops selling fruits and vegetables were forced to pay high rents, and in such circumstances, the shops had a small area to afford to poor tenants. But you can’t put a lot of goods in a small area, and watermelons of an ordinary, round shape tend to occupy large volumes of space precisely because of their non-compact configuration. To bring watermelons every day is not a cheap occupation: the fruit is large, its cost is low. So, Japanese farmers decided to provide services to fruit dealers.
They took and figured out how to grow watermelons of such a shape that they could easily be stored, take up less space, and even did not ride on the counter.
The practicality and foresight of the Japanese melon growers came to the point that they grew square watermelons of such a size that they easily fit on the shelves of Japanese refrigerators! The novelty immediately fell to the taste (and shape) of the domestic Japanese consumer. And although the costs of growing them were slightly higher (due to the need to put them in transparent boxes), and the store price exceeded the price of ordinary products by three to four times, square watermelons quickly gained popularity among the population. Many farmers from other countries began to adopt the "best practices" of the Japanese and also began to grow curly watermelons.
The farmer, the first to come up with non-standard fruits, did not immediately think of patenting his invention, and for many years many people used the fruits (both literally and figuratively) of his inventiveness. True, in the end he still took the patent, but how much money he lost over the past decades!
The invention of the Japanese farmer gave rise to a lot of imitations. Now you can order any vegetable of any shape through the online store. It is said that growing vegetables in a transparent plastic container is also good because the plastic protects the fetus from parasites. However, for Russia, the cultivation of such exotic is not very relevant. We don’t have enough time to grow square watermelons, to grow ordinary watermelons in the middle lane!
But, apparently, a square watermelon, the photo of which is decorated with many exhibitions and pages of Internet portals, is successful only in Japan and the countries closest to it. In other places, where everything is in order with the size of the retail space in the vegetable stores, we decided to trade “the old fashioned way”. Moreover, they say that the taste of a square watermelon is still lower than that of a round watermelon.
