Melothria Species, Creeping Cucumber, Guadeloupe Cucumber, Speckled Gourd

We did not have these in our Area until after the 1999 Oklahoma - Wichita Tornado. They are now a wide spread noxious weed. They freely...Read More seed, produce an over abundance of fruit which the wildlife eat and deposit the seeds with a dose of fertilizer. When they sprout you need to quickly pull them. They are like a dandelion in that if you leave a partial root they will grow back. It is the only vine that I have seen the can out-compete Virgina Creeper, Poison Ivy and Honey Suckle.

I understand the fruit is tasty when they are light green similar to a very small water melon. It is also my understanding when they start to darken they can act like a powerful laxative. Like any wild fruit you need to know what you are eating.

I love these little cucumbers! I have been calling them "cucamelons". Whatever they are, they are delicious. This year we have them growi...Read Moreng in several areas. We usually just eat them right off the vine, but they are also wonderful in a salad.

I love these plants! They grow as little vines in my side yard, and do not take over everything like many vines around here will. They ...Read Moreare also rather attractive looking. On top of that they produce jelly-bean sized edible green mini "cucumbers". They not only smell like cukes but taste like them too. I find myself foraging on them (the green ones) when they are in fruit. Also, the butterflies, esp. the native Zebra Longwings, love the tiny yellow flowers.

A native, insubstantial vine with a fairly short lifespan. It grows on my chainlink fence in the summer and then fades away. It's an at...Read Moretractive vine with pretty small yellow flowers that the bees enjoy and small fruits.

I've not encountered any tendency to run rampant or harm other plants. Perhaps it's slightly too cold here for it to become perennial and I am only seeing small annual vines.

My dog also adores the fruit and will carefully eat every one she finds, which may explain why I have fewer and fewer plants each year.

Yes, I live in Burnet, Tx and have just discovered this vine in my back yard. I am sure the birds have deposited here.
This is th...Read Moree first year that I have it in my yard and have not tasted it yet but may soon. It is first green and then turns white . I thought it was a birds egg at first on the ground and then noticed more on the vine and all connected. Very cute and small. Thanks for the pictures and helping to identify it. It took me about half an hour to find it. I have not seen any yellow flowers, maybe soon. I will keep it since I like birds and see if any of them will eat it.

Locally, I've found several Melothria vines. The cukes are tasty and wholesome when eaten green, and if they only appeared earlier, would...Read More be choice with Florida pellitory. The local vines are not terribly vigorous, and could be container-grown. In South Florida, though, I've seen them cover fences. They must be eaten green and firm. I've made salads with the green sanditas, leaf lettuce, cherry or current tomatoes, chives, and dill or green coriander, the latter is good with a little blackmint. For hot weather, such a salad should be well-chilled.

There seems to be a lot of confusion about this plant. I will attempt to clear that up. I eat this plant on a regular basis, sometimes ...Read Morein fairly large quantities. The little green cucumbers are not poisonous, until they turn dark, at which point they are bitter and are a STRONG LAXATIVE. Every once in a while I eat one that's borderline, but the ones that are too ripe taste terrible so they're not that hard to avoid, just spit them out. I've never gotten any diarrhea from eating the fruit of this plant.

RE: Green Deane

http://...Read Morewww.youtube.com/user/EatTheWeeds#p/u/51/VbHa_mqHnCc

We have a wisteria plant that just would not go away. It's in a part of the yard we don't use, so instead of fighting it we decided to bu...Read Moreild a flowerbed to surround it. After a couple of months we noticed this unknown vine TAKING OVER. It's leaves were unusual, the vine looked & felt just like a cucumber vine. At first, like alot of people, we thought it was cudsue (sp?). But out of curiousity, & despite my husband's idea of killing it, I decided to let it grow. Last week my husband noticed small greenish fruit which have since turned yellow. He went immediately to the internet & discovered it's the creeping cucumber. Now we aren't really sure what we want to do with it. Some information state it is poisonous, others state it's edible. I'm all for trying new foods, but not willing to be a lab rat. Any suggestions?

I made the mistake of thinking the tiny yellow flowers on the delicate vine were attractive and let it grow. I soon found out how much s...Read Morepace it wants; over, under and around ornamental shrubs such as azaleas.

However, I give it a "Neutral" rating because this is a native plant. Some critter somewhere may be dependent upon the vine or its fruit for sustenance, so I'm not on a rampage to totally eliminate it.

Jeremy

I planted my garden which consist of cucumbers, watermelon and lots of other veggies. I thought when these vines started growing everywhe...Read Morere close to my cucumbers that they came up from old seeds from the year before. Then when the fruit started coming, I thought OH MY GOSH Watermelons. Little did I know that they are Creeping Cucumbers as I have heard them called..... They have completely taken over the last five rows of my garden. Not real happy about this cause I enjoy growing other things and this was not on the list. Should have pulled these up when they first started....I will next year if I have the same issue.

Melothria pendula is not acutely poisonous, and some folks eat it. But still, caution should be used before considering eating th...Read Moreis plant.

http://www.ces.ncsu.edu/depts/hort/consumer/poison/Melotpe.h...

Depending on the environment it is grown in, it can be more or less toxic.

This is a very fast growing vine. It had covered my large azalea shrub b4 I had noticed it and I inspect my gardens often. I don't know...Read More if it would choke my azalea, but I'm not going to let it grow to find out.

When I was a kid in Houston, we had these growing all over a portion of our back fence, I would collect the fruits and pretend they were ...Read More"watermelons" for my Barbies and dinosaurs to eat. I never knew what they were, but my dad always told me to be careful of wild plants, so I never are them or got the juice on my skin.

I recently found that they are a wild edible plant, with a flavor similar to green grapes, though I have not had a chance to try them for myself. I was delighted to find some vines growing along the creek at a local park recently and collected some mature fruits to start here.

As with most wild plants, the key is moderation. You should not make a meal of them, or eat more than a handful or so a day.

Thank you so much for this posting!

I'll admit, I love this little vine. If it grows where I
do not approve, an eas...Read Morey yank removes it all.

This vine has erupted in my shrub and flower beds just this season. Grows faster than I can get it out. I suspect that this plant seed ...Read Morewas an unexpected benefit of my (now fired) landscaping company's pine straw. Kudzu has also appeared, so I'm really happy. If you dig out the base, will that keep the creeping cucumber from resprouting?

A word of caution to anyone who is thinking about planting this vine. In my yard, this vine has been so invasive, I thought it was kudzu...Read More.

A few years ago it showed up in my yard. In a little over a month a tangled mat of this stuff had covered a small river birch (10-15') and everything under it.

Over the past few years it has continued to grow faster than I can pull it up. Worse, it has appeared in several additional places in my yard despite the fact that I am always careful to dispose of all parts of the plant in the trash! (I'm trying to start a batch of this stuff at the local landfill.)

This plant suddenly appeared in my yard a few years ago and I have not been able to eradicate it. It pops up everywhere and it totally co...Read Morevers anything it grows on. My native Florida plants and some exotics are totally covered by this awful vine. If anyone knows how to permanently eradicate this plant, please share your information with me.

In response to MotherNature4, various sites list the plant as mildly toxic. Although the berries maybe edible they're a strong laxative a...Read Morend can cause diarrhea when too many are ingested. "Poisonous" is not a very accurate for a description, but the user should be aware too much is not a good thing.

I don't know a lot about this plant except it comes back every year. It is profilic and can cover a fence in a season. The little melons/...Read Morecucumber are cute and make a nice trellis plant....

I have checked many sites for poisonous plants, and it is NOT listed. Does anyone know the source of the above report? Guess too many c...Read Moreould have be a laxative, but so could cucumber seeds.

These tasty little cucumbers can be used in salads just like cherry tomatoes. I have used them this way in moderation for years.

Once you get a start of them, they will come up on their own. They never seem to become a pest here in central Florida.