Klowan’s titanic pumpkin was no accident

CUMBERLAND – Russ Klowan knew he had a winner in the making back in July, when the pumpkin he had started growing in the spring started packing on a whopping 50 pounds each day for 10 days.

“If you’re looking at 50 pounds a day, you can almost see it grow,” he said. “It was unbelievable. I’ve never had a pumpkin put that much weight on.”

Anyone can grow a decent-sized pumpkin, but achieving a monster in a class of its own takes hard work, skill, and a deep knowledge of how to grow, says Klowan. Even then, said this nine-year pumpkin-growing expert, you need plenty of good fortune.

Klowan, 72, a lifelong Cumberland resident who lives on Reservoir Road, was named the winner of Rhode Island’s famous Southern New England Giant Pumpkin Growers Annual Weigh-Off in Warren on Sunday, his pumpkin weighing in at 2,074.5 pounds, more than 400 pounds heavier than his previous personal best.

In second place was Alex Noel of Pomfret, Conn., who grew a 2,058-pound pumpkin. Wood Lancaster, of Massachusetts, came in third place with a pumpkin weighing 2,016 pounds.

So what’s the secret of Klowan’s success this year? He says he started earlier, putting up a portable greenhouse back in March to warm up the soil. It was so cold that he had to first clear the area on the family farm with a snowblower, he said.

The winning pumpkin seed, acquired from a friend in the hobby who would later live to regret giving it to him, started growing inside in April, moving outside to the greenhouse by the end of that month. If the ground isn’t at least 65 degrees, protected with plastic, the seed will just sit there and not do anything, Klowan says. Since he doesn’t have the heating cables some growers use, he went with the plastic.

Klowan said he’s very proud of himself. Three years into growing, he reached his goal of hitting 1,000 pounds on a pumpkin. Three more years after that, he joined the 4,000-pound club for three pumpkins combined. At that point he saw the trend of growers exceeding 2,000 pounds through cross-pollination and genetics, so he set that as his goal, finally hitting it this year. There are people who have been growing for more than 20 years who haven’t grown a pumpkin this big, he said.

“To get a 2,000-pound pumpkin, it’s very hard,” he told The Breeze.

So where does he go from here? Klowan said his wife Mary asked him the same thing and he answered that the only goal to go for next is for the world record of 2,624 pounds.

Another of Klowan’s giant pumpkins recently made the cover of The Breeze as children climbed on it at Franklin Farm’s Harvest Festival.

Klowan does his own pollination, not relying on wind and bees. It’s a complex process, he said, and just as with the human fertilization process, “sometimes it will take, and sometimes it won’t.” On the human side, just as with plant life, one son might be of average size and one a giant, he said.

Klowan said he stayed ahead of the game by having the greenhouse. Other growers were dealing with a wet and cold season, he said. His pumpkin was 122 days old at weigh-in, and others in the competition had younger pumpkins.

From September on, the pumpkin doesn’t grow outward all that much, but its inside walls grow thicker, reaching 12 inches.

Growers in the U.S. will always be at a disadvantage when competing for a world record, said Klowan, as Europe’s growers are highly advanced in greenhouses and controlling humidity and temperature. But with the right seed and the right weather, nothing is impossible.

“Everything has to be almost perfect,” he said. “You’ve got to have a lot of luck.”

Klowan was constantly testing his pumpkin’s soil and adding the three elements necessary for success: nitrogen, phosphorus and potash. He was putting them down more frequently than is typical, burying vines and spreading more fertilizer as new vines came up. A giant pumpkin needs about 1,000 square feet of space, he said, and the key is to get rid of everything around it so all of the growth can focus on the one plant.

On what happens next with the pumpkin, it’s not good for eating and will likely be sent to Patriot Place to be used for fall festivities before rotting away like all other pumpkins.