A ton of pumpkin fun, and then some
Oregon farmer’s 2,170-pound gourd wins him his 4th Half Moon Bay title
A veteran pumpkin grower’s prized possession beat out dozens of behemoth gourds Monday to win his fourth championship in Half Moon Bay.
Steve Daletas and his 2,170pound pumpkin didn’t break the world record of 2,624 pounds, but he did take home $15,190 in prize money — at $7 per pound — and a fourth green champion’s jacket. Daletas traveled from pleasant Hill, Ore., with his wife, mom and son, and he credited good weather and a mentor for his victories.
“Get to know a grower who has grown a few pumpkins,” Daletas said.
The Safeway World Championship pumpkin Weigh-Off has kicked off the fall season in Half Moon Bay since 1974. Contest participants and spectators started gathering before daybreak Monday at the I.D.E.S. Grounds, where pumpkins the size of small cars ranged in colors from green and yellow to traditional orange. Some arrived flat and wide while others were lopsided and round.
All the gourds had one common goal for this year’s competition: a $30,000 prize for a world-recordbreaking pumpkin.
Gerry Beck has attended the championship since it began more than four decades ago and noted just how much the contest has changed.
“Back then, 150 (pounds) was pretty good,” he said. “Now you’ve got to beat 2,000. But I just love coming and seeing all the people we know. Every year there’s more people coming from everywhere.”
This year’s entrants included experienced farmers and first-time growers mainly hailing from the
“It’s always been a dream of mine to go to this. It’s a lot bigger than I thought it’d be, so nerves are high.” Josiah Brandt of Rudolph, Wisc., whose pumpkin won second place
Bay Area, Oregon and Washington.
The second-place finisher, Josiah Brandt, drove his pumpkin 34 hours from Rudolph, Wis., to participate in the contest.
“It’s always been a dream of mine to go to this,” he said. “It’s a lot bigger than I thought it’d be, so nerves are high.”
At 2,136 pounds, Brandt’s pumpkin missed the top spot by just 34 pounds.
He plans to sell the freakishly large fruit to Logan Paul, a YouTube star, after it goes on display, along with the other four top winners, at the Half Moon Bay Art & Pumpkin Festival on Saturday and Sunday.
Other growers’ plans for their pumpkins include smashing them, selling them and even sailing them.
Charity Marshall, from Castle Rock, Wash., entered her pumpkin not to win the weigh-off, but to join the 4,000-pound club. As part of the Great Pumpkin Common Wealth, growers can join the club and win a special jacket if they enter three pumpkins in three different contests in one year that add up to 4,000 pounds.
Marshall needed hers to weigh about 1,450 pounds. When 1,458 flashed on the scale, she broke down into happy tears.
“I knew it wasn’t going to be the largest,” Marshall said. “I just wanted the jacket.”
Marshall also holds the Guinness World Record for the longest pumpkin paddle, a feat she accomplished in October 2016 on the Cowlitz River in Washington. Next up she’ll take her pumpkin to the West Coast Giant Pumpkin Regatta, where she’ll carve it out and paddle it across Tualatin Lake at the Commons in Oregon.
As a spectator at Tuesday’s weigh off, Helen Perry hoped to network and get some tips on growing her own giant pumpkin.
“I’ve paid as much as $30 for a seed, but it molded and didn’t even produce a plant. I was pretty brokenhearted about that,” she said. “I tried growing one hydroponically, but the cat got into that one. I have deer eating my plants, too.”
John Muller, better known in pumpkin circles as Farmer John, appreciated the opportunity to spotlight his profession and Half Moon Bay business. Muller runs Farmer John’s Pumpkin Farm, where he invites children to learn about the science of farming.
“It’s a wonderful community event for us and people have an opportunity to be this close to urban agriculture and open space,” Muller said. “And I think it’s a value we little farmers are still sharing.”
For Daletas, who previously won the championship in 2001, 2003 and 2015, the work is far from over.
“We’ll start planning for next year tomorrow, if not today, on the way home,” he said.