Each fall at the Alaska State Fair in Palmer, Alaska, there is a competition for the largest vegetables from around the state.
Here are Pictures from 2006
During the summer, Alaska's long daylight hours and heavy
rain does strange things to vegetables.
They grow, and grow, and grow
A WORLD RECORD
AND TO GIVE YOU SOME PERSPECTIVE OF HOW BIG THIS REALLY IS
Tell a friend, they are not going to believe this
Palmer, Alaska located about 45 miles north of Anchorage, is in the Matanuska-Susitna valley
where glacial run-off is loaded with glacial silt that collects along the Matanuska River. Frequent high
winds blow the silt from the river throughout the Palmer area, continually enriching the soil with nutrients.
Palmer is far enough North that from May to early September it doesn't get totally dark at night, with 2.5 to 3
hours of semi-darkness each night. Temperatures during that same timeframe can get as high as in the 90s.
With the super rich soil, long daylight hours and hot summers, it is possible to grow gigantic vegetables.
Published: August 25, 2006
Last Modified: August 25, 2006 at 09:28 AM
PALMER -- Maybe you don't like all this cool, wet weather. Officials at the Alaska State Fair aren't that crazy about it either, knowing how a blustery day can throw a serious dampener on fair attendance.
But rutabagas apparently love the rain. So do turnips and beets and most of the other root vegetables and cold crops that have been soaking up storm water in Southcentral Alaska quite happily all August long.
None so ravenously as one 82-pound kohlrabi, which shattered the old world record for kohlrabies by nearly 20 pounds this week.
Several of this year's largest home-grown vegetables were on display Thursday for the opening day of the fair, including the record-breaking kohlrabi grown by Palmer gardener Scott Robb.
Along with Robb's obvious knack for growing giant vegetables -- he holds five other world records -- you can also credit the rain.
Toward the end of the recent deluge, Robb and his wife, Mardie, knew they had some hefty-looking kohlrabies coming to harvest. But they didn't realize just how big they were until they began to peel off some of the leaves that shield the bulb, which grows slightly off the ground.
"When we began removing the leaves we said, 'Oh my gosh, oh my gosh ...'?" Mardie recalled.
The heavy rains, however, played havoc with the giant cabbages, which aren't scheduled to be weighed and judged until a week from today.
Big cabbages like cold, wet weather, too, but they draw the line at flash floods.
"Their leaves are so big -- they just sit there like big bowls and they load up with water in heavy rain," Scott Robb said. "It can break the leaves over.
"Then eventually, if they stay damp long enough or wet long enough, they'll start to rot. And that's what you're going to see at the Giant Cabbage Weigh Off next week -- a lot of stinky, rotten cabbages."
If they even make it to the fair.
According to Kathy Liska, the fair's crop supervisor, entries are down sharply, partly because of the rain. Some of the farms and gardens to the north, where flooding knocked out bridges and stranded homeowners, have been no-shows so far.
"I don't think I have many at all from up there," Liska reported. "They were under water.
"You guys had a great picture of that cabin floating down the river. I think that's where the gardens went too."
The other key factor, Liska said, was the late spring, which resulted in a late summer and later-than-normal harvests. In a big year, she said, the fair usually receives about 2,000 crop entries. So far it has received about 500.
But Robb expects that to change dramatically next Wednesday, when the fair stages its "second entry" weigh-in for growers whose crops need just a little more time.
Rumor has it there's a pumpkin set to be trailered up from Nikiski that might tip the scales at more than 1,000 pounds, which would be a state record but not a world record. And Robb, himself, might have even larger vegetables to enter.
"I have two more kohlrabi that should be even bigger than what I have here now," he said. "And I have a zucchini that's probably 60 pounds right now."
Which wouldn't add to his slate of world records -- which include a 39-pound turnip, a 42-pound kale, a 63-pound celery, a 65-pound cantaloupe and a 75-pound rutabaga, the last of which earned Robb a trip to the David Letterman Show -- but would still be fairly decent, setting another state record.
And a fair day at the fair.
Daily News reporter George Bryson can be reached at gbryson@adn.com.
Those are giant turnips on the white stand. Notice the 2.4 lb
tomato with the first place blue ribbon and check out the
2 lb giant carrot in front of the giant potato, bottom center.
Let's take a closer look at the zucchini. The first place blue
ribbon winner is 24.314 lbs; the second place red ribbon
winner came in at 17.043 lbs.
Big veggies all over the place. Notice the 63.95 lb head of
cabbage, the giant lettuce, sunflower plants, squash, and
notice the giant cucumbers in the bottom right.
And the 2004 grand-daddy of them all, a 707 lb pumpkin ! !
Gives the salad bar a whole new meaning, doesn't it? Back to the Top
