Circleville pumpkin growers speak on tough growing season.

CIRCLEVILLE, Ohio (WCMH) -- What would the Circleville Pumpkin Show be without the giant pumpkins?

Some of the pumpkin growers, including this year's grand champion, said with a tough growing season they faced some challenges, but held out hope to make it to this year's weigh-in.

Many of the growers have decades of experience, and there's one name that comes top of mind when thinking of the unimaginably large pumpkins sometimes weighing upwards of 2,000 pounds.

"So, it's a disease," Liggett. "Once you've been involved in the pumpkin show and the fun of it and talking to the people that come to the show, you talk about how to grow pumpkins, it's just fun. Look forward to it every year."

Liggett comes with an impressive track topping the leader board of the largest pumpkin many times over the past three decades. He even set a state record in 2023 with a 2,388.5-pound pumpkin (The current Ohio state record was set this year by Jared Persinger at 2,505 pounds).

"I'm just happy that we made it here because sometimes when they quit growing it's an indication that something's not right," he said.

This year, Liggett's 1,663-pound pumpkin was beaten out by Mike Helberg's at 1,972 pounds. This was Helberg's first win and the largest pumpkin he's personally ever grown.

While impressive in size, it was tough to get the plants to make it through the summer.

"We didn't do very well," Helberg said. "We lost about three-quarters of the plant in June from the floods and the humidity. So, this pumpkin actually only grew on about six side vines from the main vines."

"It took us a long time to really figure out why we would pollinate a pumpkin, but it wouldn't set," Liggett said. "It would just shrivel up after a few days and it was because of the humidity.

From what was left of the plant, they said managing the dry and rainless days of early fall was much easier.

"I'm fortunate I actually have access to water, so no problems there and we did have a shade cloth over most of the patch," Liggett said.

Both Liggett and Helberg said for them, the pumpkin show isn't about winning, it's about the comradery among growers, the joy it brings to their families and visitors and maybe even inspiring the next person to have their shot at growing one of their own, too.

"In 2004, I came to the pumpkin show and saw the big pumpkins and talked to the growers and they gave me some seeds and so I just started, got the itch to grow them," Helberg said.

"If you look here, there's so many pumpkins that just look so beautiful and I think that's what we all try to do," Liggett said. "We try to have beautiful pumpkins for the visitors that come to our pumpkin show to see."

To qualify for the pumpkin weigh in, the pumpkins must be grown within a 25-mile radius of downtown Circleville.