He set out to squash rivals’ dreams and he succeeded. Retired commercial farmer Scott Andrusz spent sleepless nights tending to a giant gourd in his field and finally came up with a new US record – a plump pumpkin weighing in at 2,554 pounds.
The latest record holder for heaviest pumpkin grown in the US tended his prize pie filling in upstate New York and pureed the previous record holder, a grower in New Hampshire whose 2,528 monster set the national standard in 2018, but in the end wasn’t a patch on Andrusz’s.
The 63-year-old in Clarence, near Buffalo, had hoped to grow the heaviest pumpkin in New York state but ended up a national champion.
“Give it all the best stuff you can think of to give it, all the fertilizer, kelp, worm castings, chicken refuse,” Andrusz told Gothamist. “And a ton of water. Every time she’s thirsty you gotta go give her a drink.”
The previous New York state record was 2,517 pounds, a news release said.
The winning gourd will be on display at Clarence’s Great Pumpkin Farm fall festival through October 16.
A grower in Italy holds the world record for heaviest pumpkin, with a 2,702-pound squash in 2021, according to Guinness World Records.
Andrusz reportedly had a giant pumpkin ready to compete for a record last fall but it cracked just before the harvest.
To get his latest gorgeous gourd to fruition, he stayed up nights protecting it from raccoons and other animals set on nibbling or damaging it.
“All the animals and critters seem to love this pumpkin more than anything in the world. They all want to eat on it. And I have cats come and try to scratch it, they think it’s a big couch,” he told Gothamist.
He needed the help of relatives, but even with that the intense care took up so much time he neglected his previously much-loved hobby of fishing, he said.
