Nobleford gardener raises huge vegetables this growing season

By Trevor Busch - Lethbridge Herald on August 31, 2022.

LETHBRIDGE HERALDtbusch@lethbridgeherald.com

As the local growing season draws to a close in southern Alberta, gardens have been bearing the fruit and vegetables that green thumbs work so hard for throughout the spring and summer months.

Last week, Nobleford gardener Jerry Den Boon dropped by The Herald office to show off the prodigious size of some of the vegetables that have been generated from his 2400 square foot garden in 2022.

“That’s my hobby, I think everybody in town knows I grow a garden,” said Den Boon.

Den Boon displayed a Sweet Success cucumber that weighed in at 1.625 kg (3lbs 6oz), and an Kelsae onion that came in at 645 grams (1lbs 6 3/4oz).

“I could have let it get bigger, but then it wouldn’t be edible anymore,” said Den Boon, referring to the cucumber. “At this point, you could still take it home and feed it to your kids. I’ve grown them larger, but then, like I say, they’re not edible. They’ll get probably half again bigger, but then they’re not edible.”

He said in previous seasons his onions have also been a lot larger than the example he provided from 2022.

“I’ve had an onion that weighed four pounds. Cherry tomatoes, we’ve had really good years where they’re just hanging on there like grapes. It just seems every year the weather is just fitting for one or the other to be really abundant.”

Den Boon pointed out that unless you’re looking to purposely grow a record-setter, cucumbers become inedible after a certain point.

“People will look at these and say, ‘That’s too big to eat’, but really these are still good. It’s the variety. We can pick these – they get long and slim at first – and I’ll pick them and give them to customers for bread and butter pickles, and then these bigger ones we just use them as slicers or cucumber salad or whatever people want to use them for.”

Part of the size can be accounted for by the variety, but Den Boon’s cucumber managed to escape the attention of the gardener for some time, which helps account for its volume.

“It’s the variety. This one was hiding under some leaves, and I was picking from the other side because I don’t want to step on the vines because it makes the cucumbers go bitter – so you’re always a little bit careful – and I just never noticed this one. And then the other day, with the wind or whatever, I saw something shiny beneath the leaves.”

Den Boon pursues gardening and horticulture as a hobby in his retirement.

“It’s just a hobby. I retired 10 years ago, and I’ve grown a garden all my life. My wife, the last year she canned, did 351 jars, everything from applesauce to zucchini and anything in between.”

The 2022 growing season was bit slow in getting started, but the heat through June – August turned around many gardens.

“It started out really poor last year and this year, because of the cold weather. And then once the heat came on we saw quite a change. The heat and the rain that we got was enough to turn things around. It was too late for the cherry tomatoes though,” said Den Boon.

“It’s been a fun year. An interesting year for sure, with the weather.”

Comments are closed.