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Just one week after a farmer in upstate New York set the record for the heaviest pumpkin ever grown in North America, that record has already been squashed by a grower in Minnesota.
The massive 2,560-pound gourd was unveiled in California on Monday, Oct. 10, at the 49th Safeway World Championship Pumpkin Weigh-Off in Half Moon Bay, near San Francisco.
Grown by Travis Gienger, of Anoka, Minnesota, it just barely beat out the previous pumpkin king, Scott Andrusz, of Williamsville in Erie County, who wowed judges with his 2,554-pound pumpkin at the World Pumpkin Weigh Off in Clarence on Saturday, Oct. 1.
At the time, Andrusz’ pumpkin shattered the previous national record of 2,528 pounds, earning him a cash prize of $5,000.
While certainly impressive, Gienger’s enormous pumpkin doesn’t come close to beating the world record of 2,702 pounds, set by a grower in Italy in 2021, according to the Guinness World Records.
Moral of the story: In the world of competitive crop growing, as Frank Sinatra famously said, you’re riding high in April, shot down in May (or in this case October).
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