Championship of giant vegetables | The biggest pumpkin of the year weighs almost 500 kilos

Homeland|Championship of giant vegetables

Finland the titles of the largest vegetables were discussed at the Giant Vegetable Championship held in Mäntsälä on Saturday.

The competition’s heaviest vegetables were seen in the giant pumpkins series. The Finnish championship was won with a pumpkin weighing 487.2 kilograms. The difference to the individual who came in second was well over a hundred kilos.

The breeder of the championship pumpkin is a resident of Hauho in Hämeenlinna Timo Iisakkila. First place was his third championship in a row in the series of giant pumpkins.

“I’ve been lucky. Sometimes it goes like this,” Iisakkila said.

In the past in years the title was won with pumpkins weighing around 300 kilos, so this year the bar was raised much higher.

For example, this year’s runner-up, from Tohmajärvi Laura Pirhonen pumpkin he grew, weighed 319.6 kilos. It would easily have been gold in the previous two years.

However, this year’s winner was still far from the record pumpkins. The Finnish record is from 2012, when the winning pumpkin weighed no less than 716 kilograms.

There is still more to go to the world’s largest pumpkins. The world record from another year is held by a pumpkin from an Italian grower, which weighed 1,226 kilograms.

Isakkila says they are “farm boys” and got the spark to grow giant pumpkins from the other side of the Atlantic.

“Over there in America, they have grown a lot of these. I thought that could be quite a nice activity,” Iisakkila says.

According to his own words, he doesn’t have any special pop skills to make a pumpkin swell. However, he has a few reasons.

“Sprouting should start early at the beginning of April. The seedling will be transplanted outside in May,” says Iisakkila.

The soil in the growing area should be loamy and very spongy. It is also worth fertilizing the land in advance. Then we water – and a lot.

“About 230 liters was a normal daily watering. I watered the pumpkins with a watering can from spring to autumn,” says Iisakkila.

“It drinks a lot of water. I got to work on it.”

Giant pumpkins Iisakkila actually had two this year. According to him, the second one would have been bigger than the winning individual by a couple of hundred kilos, but it was so soft that it would not have been brought to the competition site intact.

In the SM competition, all participants grow a specific Atlantic Giant variety of giant pumpkin. In cultivation, you may use “usual cultivation methods” such as plant fertilizers. In addition, the pumpkin must be intact, i.e. it must not have, for example, deep holes or cracks.

According to Iisakkila, the winning pumpkin will probably be taken to a display somewhere next. Then it is “of course” eaten. The giant is also known to be used during the Halloween party at the turn of October-November.

“Yes, you can make quite a few pies and soups out of it. On Halloween, the pumpkin should be carved,” says Iisakkila.