For eight years, Joe Adkins of Wheaton has felt a ton of pressure trying to reach his goal of growing a 2,000-pound giant pumpkin.
That weight has finally been lifted.
Adkins crossed the 2,000-pound threshold with one of his homegrown giant pumpkins.
His 2,021-pounder took first place at the Illinois Giant Pumpkin Growers Association weigh-off on Saturday. Adkins didn’t know how much it weighed until it went on the scale during the event in Minooka.
“It was so unbelievable,” he said Thursday. “I’ve been shooting for this for the longest time, so I can’t even tell you the excitement I felt. It still feels so incredible. Best day ever.”
Adkins started growing giant pumpkins in 2008 when he wanted a bigger canvas for his pumpkin carving hobby.
Though he says it was tough at first, Adkins by 2010 had grown a 579-pounder, and he was hooked.
“I’ve entered competitively each year since,” he said.
Joe Adkins shows off the heavyweight championship belt he took home after winning the Illinois Giant Pumpkin Growers Association weigh-off. He’s a seven-time champion.
Rick West/rwest@dailyherald.com
He’s now a seven-time state champion. “But who’s counting?” he said with a laugh.
Adkins grows three giant pumpkins a year, with two growing on one side of his Childs Street home and one on the other. They each get roughly 750 square feet of space.
Joe Adkins grew a 2,021-pound pumpkin in the yard of his Wheaton home.
Rick West/rwest@dailyherald.com
He said he takes copious notes every year, weighing the positives and negatives of each season in his effort to grow bigger pumpkins.
During their peak growing time, which lasts about a month and a half, Adkins can spend as much as seven hours a day tending to them. Each pumpkin would get about 150 gallons a day of water during this period and “bags and bags and bags of fertilizer,” he said.
Joe Adkins of Wheaton is a seven-time champion for growing the biggest pumpkin annually at the Illinois Giant Pumpkin Growers Association weigh-off.
Rick West/rwest@dailyherald.com
His 2,021-pound pride and joy took 119 days to grow from start to finish. Adkins admits it isn’t much to look at from a traditional pumpkin perspective.
“Fortunately, ugly doesn’t matter,” he said.
He hopes this pumpkin will be the sire to his next great achievement. The seed that grew it came from an 1,850-pound pumpkin Adkins grew last year.
“That’s one of the things I’m most proud of,” he said. “I was super excited that was the one that broke the 2,000-pound mark.”
Adkins sells the seeds he doesn’t use on eBay to offset the costs of growing the giant pumpkins. He also offers instructions and gives out his phone number to buyers if they want to text for help.
“It’s fun to see someone catch the giant pumpkin bug,” he said.
Adkins now has his sights set on beating the state record of 2,145 pounds set in 2015. It’s the same 150-ish-pound gap range he had when he aimed for 2,000.
“It’s time for that record to come down,” he said.
While giant pumpkins don’t really have any flavor, Adkins said his pumpkins could make anywhere between 500 and 1,000 pies.
Joe Adkins talks to brothers Bob, left, and Bill Harazin after they stopped on Thursday to look at the giant pumpkins in Adkins’ front yard.
Rick West/rwest@dailyherald.com
They may not make good pies, but they’re great for carving.
Adkins said he gets as many as 500 trick-or-treaters a year on Halloween and hears from neighbors that stops at his house are a family tradition, with parents bringing their kids by for pictures each Halloween as both the pumpkins and the children get bigger each year.
“That’s one of the things that’s super special about this,” he said. “I love to see people see something and not believe it. … To make a little bit of magic and see their reaction is pretty cool.”