LAFAYETTE, N.Y. (AP) - He's a plumber by trade, but in his spare time Gary Adams is the pumpkin-growing king of New York state.
Adams grows foreign perennials on his 60-acre property in the town of Lafayette, just south of Syracuse. He also specializes in growing gargantuan gourds so big that he has to haul them around in the back of his truck.
This year, he has grown a pumpkin that weighs in at just over 1,613 pounds. At nearly 6 feet across and a little less than 4 feet tall, it's the largest pumpkin measured in the state in 2011.
The pumpkin won first place in the World Pumpkin Weigh-Off held earlier this fall at The Great Pumpkin Farm in Clarence, outside Buffalo.
