South Africa has a new record for the country’s heaviest pumpkin, at 904,5kg, grown by Mossel Bay farm manager Willem Le Grange.
This was announced following last weekend’s annual Giant Pumpkin Festival held in Heidelberg, Western Cape.
Le Grange is no stranger to growing giant pumpkins. At the same festival last year he was runner up, with a 867,5kg gourd. For his win he received prize money of R30 000.
The week prior, Gauteng’s pumpkin growers had taken part in the annual Goliat Van Gat pumpkin festival held in Silverton, Pretoria. There, Wykus Lamprecht of Meyerton took home first prize with a pumpkin weighing in at 846kg.
Both Le Grange and Lamprecht’s winning pumpkins were grown from seed harvested from Lamprecht’s previous prize-winning pumpkin.
While this year’s effort is a new South African record it is still a long way off the world’s heaviest pumpkin, a 1 226kg monster grown by an Italian farmer in 2021.
Main image: Lamprecht (left) congratulates Le Grange in Heidelberg, Western Cape on 26 March. Credit: Facebook