Pumpkin Harvest.......

So at long last the pumpkins have left the building! .... Not in an Elvis style limo, but on the back of Jim’s truck.

A small group of tuggers and lifters assembled to help us get them loaded this morning, and here I am “posing” amongst the pumpkins.

The larger one of the two should apparently weigh around 170lbs, which is roughly 12 stones in old money. This is calculated by using the very cunning measurement to weight ratio, that you can find on this American pumpkin enthusiast site. Basically you take three specific measurements over and around the beast, add them together, and look up the total on the chart provided. This then tells you the equivalent weight in lbs. They reckon that this method should be accurate to within 5% either way, in the majority of cases.

Those of you from the US-of-A where truly huge fruits are grown for competitions all over the country, are probably wondering what all the fuss is about these two rather unremarkable small gourds. (The current World Record is a mind boggling 1,469 lbs !) Locally however, these are seen as being pretty big stuff. The record at the Tonbridge area show, which I just missed entering, is only 132 lbs.

We didn’t measure the smaller one, but based on picking them up between us, I’d say it is about two thirds of the weight.

Tomorrow is Harvest Festival in Churches around here, the larger one has gone to Hadlow Parish Church, where Jim (in white) and I roped in a passing church warden to help us unload. The other has gone to the Tonbridge Methodist Church, that Jim and his wife attend. Sadly we weren’t able to hang around to see them fully “dressed” by the flower ladies, but here are a couple of pics anyway.

Thanks Jim, John, Geoff & Sue for your help!