Home Grown 09

Right Now – Home Grown Cantaloupes League City You wanna taste the best melons this side of the Pecos? Cantaloupes that isand theyre grown right here, in the Bay Area, in League City, along Hwy 3 between 518 and 96. Thats right! You cant miss the rich white sandy soil that sits on the west side of Hwy 3 and the aroma of cantaloupes. But you will miss the cantaloupe sign (if the sign is down-theyre out) if you dont get there early. This morning they didnt even get a chance to get the sign up before they sold out. 50 or so melons were gone in about 10 minutes. Johnny Pete Daro is the guy with the green thumb, hes 87 years young and has been growing these peach colored melons, on this same land, for over 70 years. This is a family affair and you will find Margaret Daro 73, Catherine Daro Palermo 76, George the Mule Bilotta 71, and the young un Frank Palermo 55 tossing melons to one another human chain style every morning thru about the second week in July. They toss the melons to save steps and to keep the damage to the patch to a minimum. Johnny has farmed that land his whole life and is the last farmer in Galveston County. In fact he was born where the McCoys Lumber Yard is (Im sure he was born in a housemaybe a barnIm sure it wasnt a field). He was farming about 35 acres but sold 14 to CCISD for the new elementary school. I asked Johnny where that soil came from and he said the property used to be a river bed (way before our time) and that is one of the reasons why his …