Published: October 13, 2009 11:06 pm      

NORTH TONAWANDA: Cedar Street man grows mammoth 800 pound pumpkin

Who knows what sort of inhuman, unnatural things are being cultivated in those fenced-in backyards as Halloween in North Tonawanda draws near.

Resident Jeremy Robinson, for one, has been busy raising an Atlantic Giant behind his house at 46 Cedar St.

Its 882 pound carcass was once very much alive, nurtured all summer by Robinson himself. That is until one day he was forced to kill it ... or perhaps “pick” would be a better word.

It’s carcass, lifeless but perfectly preserved, is now stored in his garage.

The Atlantic Giant is one of a variety of very special pumpkin seeds capable of growing squash-like fruits that are freakishly large.

The 29-year-old Robinson officially had his pumpkin weighed two weeks ago on a scale in Pumpkinville, appropriately enough, a farm located in the southern tier near Great Valley.

The man known as the mayor of Pumpkinville, Dan Pawlowski, remembers Robinson’s pumpkin well.

“He was hoping to get a 1,000 pounds — he didn’t get that but it was a record for him,” he said regarding the weigh-off including a total of 29 such giant pumpkins.

Fourteen of those topped the 1,000 pound mark, he said with the winner being one Pete Snyder from Bessemer, Pa., whose fruit came in at more than 1,300 pounds.

The only real competition was from a grower in the Cleveland area, he said. Another pumpkin raised by a spouse of that contestant had set the world record the day before, with Christine Harp weighing her pumpkin in at 1,725 pounds.

“It was the biggest pumpkin ever grown,” he said.

The New York state record is held by Dan and Jason McKee of Gasport, with a pumpkin that weighed about 1,625 pounds.

Of Robinson’s 882 pound labor of love, Pawlowski said: “That’s a great weight and he’s a relatively new grower. He’s done a great job.”

In fact, Robinson said this is the second year he has planted the special seeds in his 50-by-50-foot backyard. He was turned on to what he and most growers call an “addicting hobby” after picking up a packet of “giant” seeds at Lowes. The first batch were on average about 60 pounds each, he said.

Then he found a Web site, bigpumpkins.com, that features growers’ diaries and tips.

“The rest was history,” he said.

Last year he produced one that weighed 357 pounds and displayed it for amazed trick-or-treaters.

The seeds are produced from giant pumpkins and often growers will save seeds from large growths to plant the next year. This year, he started growing his seeds in his garage in April, with a neighbor sometimes coming over to turn off a makeshift greenhouse when he was out.

He installed heating cables to keep the soil warn when he moved the thing outside in May, he said.

Of course, Robinson plans to carve his new creation. He plans to use a kitchen knife to carve it, he said, for display outside his house on Halloween.

He said the walls of the giant fruits are often eight to 10 inches thick, and knows of growers who opt for to use an electric saw to do their carvings.

“I can’t wait to see their faces when they come around this year,” he said.

So what do you do with all the pumpkin guts?

“Kind of like those guys who used to shoot big deer you drag ‘em around on your car and show ‘em to everybody,” Pawlowski said.

Robinson acknowledged they’re not very good for pies and are more hollow inside than their regular-sized counterparts.

But just moving the massive plants from patch to pickup can be daunting. Robinson built a 16-foot wooden tripod with a chain heist this year.

“I had about 10 people over that day,” Robinson said. “Usually what you do is you hoist the pumpkin up and you drive the truck underneath it.”

Contact reporter Neale Gulleyat 693-1000, ext. 114.