Subscribe | UPI Odd Newsletter Subscribe PALMER, Alaska, Aug. 18 (UPI) -- At least one Alaskan has something to celebrate about the state's unusually hot summer -- a record 64.8 pound cantaloupe grown in his nursery. Scott Robb, of Palmer, brought the massive beauty to the Alaska State fairgrounds for show and tell, the Anchorage Daily News reported Wednesday. Advertisement Temperatures have been soaring throughout the state this summer. In Anchorage, Tuesday marked the 43rd straight day of 70-plus degree weather, tying the record set in 1936. Robb's muskmelon may be the largest ever grown in the world, officials said, and growing a mammoth melon in Alaska is unheard of since the fruit craves heat and founders in rain. The current world-record cantaloupe at 63.5 pounds belongs to a grower in the loamy, sun-baked fields of North Carolina. Robb owns four other world records: a 75.75-pound rutabaga from 1999, a 42.4-pound kale and 43.7-pound kohlrabi from 2001, and last year, a 63.3-pound celery that looked more like a leafy ornamental bush than a vegetable.
