AS IT IS 2016-10-13 Pumpkins Are Huge As Halloween Approaches

AS IT IS 2016-10-13 Pumpkins² Are Huge As Halloween Approaches

This is What’s Trending Today:

October might seem to be pumpkin¹ month in the U.S.

The holiday of Halloween comes on October 31. Americans around the country are already using social media to show off their pumpkin growing and carving³ skills.

Pumpkins are round, orange fruits related to squashes⁵ and gourds⁶. People use their flesh and seeds for food, but they are also popular decorations in the fall.

In the weeks before Halloween, people like to carve faces and other decorations into pumpkins. Halloween is a popular holiday where American children dress in costumes and go from home to home asking for candy. It is called “Trick-or-Treating.”

Two big pumpkins recently made headlines in the U.S.

A farmer in the northeastern state of Rhode Island broke the record for the largest pumpkin ever grown in North America.

Richard Wallace’s pumpkin weighed 1,026 kilograms. It broke his son’s record from 2015. Ron Wallace’s pumpkin only weighed 1,011 kilograms last year.

A schoolteacher in the northwestern state of Washington brought her large pumpkin to an event in California. Her pumpkin was the champion, weighing 866 kilograms.

It turns out that Cindy Tobeck’s pumpkin grew from one of the seeds from Ron Wallace’s pumpkin from 2015.

While those pumpkins are large, they are still not the largest in the world.

According to the website BigPumpkins.com, Richard Wallace’s pumpkin is only the second-heaviest pumpkin of the year. A man in Belgium produced a pumpkin that weighed almost 1,200 kilograms.

Smithsonian magazine wrote a story about people who try to grow large pumpkins. In 35 years, the size of record pumpkins has grown from about 225 kilograms to over 1,000 kilograms.

Pumpkin farmers trying to grow record fruits are taking the seeds of champion pumpkins from one year and breeding them with other large pumpkins.

But people are not just growing pumpkins. They are carving them, too.

One Twitter user from Britain recently posted a photo of a pumpkin designed to look like U.S. presidential candidate Donald Trump⁷.

No word of a Hillary Clinton pumpkin design. But one pumpkin farmer in California allows visitors to shoot small pumpkins out of a cannon⁸.

The targets? Large paper cut-outs of both Trump and Clinton.

And that’s What’s Trending Today.

Words in This Story

carve – v. to cut (something, such as a pattern or design) into a surface— often + into or on

cannon – n. a large gun that shoots heavy metal or stone balls and that was once a common military weapon

record – n. a performance or achievement that is the best of its kind

squash⁴ – n. a type of fruit (such as a pumpkin) that has a usually hard skin and that is eaten cooked

1 pumpkin   

n.南瓜

参考例句：

• They ate turkey and pumpkin pie.他们吃了火鸡和南瓜馅饼。
• It looks like there is a person looking out of the pumpkin!看起来就像南瓜里有人在看着你！

2 pumpkins   

n.南瓜( pumpkin的名词复数 )；南瓜的果肉，南瓜囊

参考例句：

• I like white gourds, but not pumpkins. 我喜欢吃冬瓜，但不喜欢吃南瓜。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Then they cut faces in the pumpkins and put lights inside. 然后在南瓜上刻出一张脸，并把瓜挖空。 来自英语晨读30分（高三）

3 carving   

n.雕刻品，雕花

参考例句：

• All the furniture in the room had much carving.房间里所有的家具上都有许多雕刻。
• He acquired the craft of wood carving in his native town.他在老家学会了木雕手艺。

4 squash   

n.壁球，摺皱不堪，拥挤嘈杂的人群，浓缩果汁，美国南瓜；vt.压扁，压制；vi.变扁，压榨

参考例句：

• He is drinking lemon squash.他正在喝柠檬露。
• She sprained her ankle playing squash.她在打软式墙网球时扭伤了脚踝。

5 squashes   

n.拥挤的人群( squash的名词复数 )；果汁汽水；南瓜小果（主要种类为笋瓜 winter squash 和西葫芦 summer squash）；（软式）墙网球v.挤进( squash的第三人称单数 )；将（某人[某物]）压扁；将（某人[某物]）向某方挤；平定（叛乱等）

参考例句：

• They cultivated maize, beans, squashes, and tobacco, in garden beds. 他们在园圃的土坛上种植玉蜀黍、菜豆、南瓜和烟草。 来自辞典例句
• Bug Squash Tummy-Here the bug pats hellos stomach and It'squashes and stretches. 这个虫子轻轻打它的肚子，注重肚子上边有挤压拉伸形变。 来自互联网

6 gourds   

n.葫芦( gourd的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Dried gourds are sometimes used as ornaments. 干葫芦有时用作饰品。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The villagers use gourds for holding water. 村民们用葫芦盛水。 来自《简明英汉词典》

7 trump   

n.王牌，法宝；v.打出王牌，吹喇叭

参考例句：

• He was never able to trump up the courage to have a showdown.他始终鼓不起勇气摊牌。
• The coach saved his star player for a trump card.教练保留他的明星选手，作为他的王牌。

8 cannon   

n.大炮，火炮；飞机上的机关炮

参考例句：

• The soldiers fired the cannon.士兵们开炮。
• The cannon thundered in the hills.大炮在山间轰鸣。