FOURTH OF JULY CELEBRATION : Seedless Is the Trend in Melon Land

If there were an endangered list for produce, watermelons with seeds would be on it.

Those irksome black seeds that must be painstakingly expelled from every mouthful of rosy flesh may go the way of the spotted owl. Seedless watermelons are rapidly gaining popularity, even if they are in limited supply.

“People are in a hurry these days,” said Minos Athanassiadis, part owner of Underwood Ranch, a melon farm in Somis. Eating watermelons full of seeds, even on the Fourth of July, “is too much hassle,” he said.

Although the trend is just beginning, the traditional watermelon riddled with seeds is losing ground to its seedless counterpart, particularly among young, health-conscious baby boomers who frequent an ever-increasing array of salad bars.

Underwood Ranch, the largest melon farm in Ventura County, expects to grow 300,000 pounds of seedless watermelons this year, a dramatic increase since it began cultivating the hybrid two years ago.

Demand is high. At most roadside stands and supermarkets where watermelon aficionados must choose between the two, the seedless ones triumph, other growers said.

Seeded watermelons are always passed up at Staben Farms in favor of seedless ones, said Janice Brousseau, sales manager for the Camarillo-based farm.

Brousseau attributes the seeded melons’ decline to the obstacle course a conventional slice of watermelon poses. Tables and floors tend to be littered with seeds and rinds after a melon is eaten, Brousseau said.

Seedless watermelons, by contrast, are “more convenient eating. It’s easier for the kids to eat,” she said.

The higher price demanded for seedless watermelons fails to deter most shoppers. At about 20 cents a pound, seedless varieties cost up to four times as much as conventional watermelons and are usually much smaller.

Growers hope seedless watermelons will boost sales that have dipped in the past decade. Americans devour fewer watermelons than their forefathers.

In 1960, every man, woman and child ate an average of 16 pounds of the fruit a year, said Shawn Allison, a marketing assistant at Underwood Ranch. But demographic changes have sliced into the traditional market.

The size of families has shrunk, and childless baby boomers are less inclined to buy whole watermelons only to have uneaten portions rot in the refrigerator, Allison said. By 1980, watermelon consumption had dipped so low that Americans were eating only about 10 pounds a year.

Luckily for growers, the rise of fruit and salad bars has swelled watermelon sales, Allison said. The average person today eats about 13 pounds of watermelons a year.

Watermelon growers sell about $14 million of seedless varieties a year, said Lori Takahama, a spokeswoman for the Indio-based Sun World International, the largest grower of seedless watermelons on the West Coast.

Still, it is unlikely that seeded watermelons will become extinct overnight, she said. Because they are more difficult to grow, seedless watermelons make up only about 7% of the national watermelon market. Seedless watermelons are produced by planting hybrid seedlings alongside seeded varieties so the plants can cross-pollinate, with the seeded variety producing hybrid seeds.

Despite the messiness, there are still some traditionalists whose idea of a good picnic is to eat around the little black seeds.

“I like to spit them out,” said Roberta Algrove, 41, of Simi Valley as she bought fruit at Mr. C’s Produce stand near Santa Paula. “I think I can can live with the seeds.”