LAWAI — About 20 feet off the ground, with his legs wrapped around a tree and holding on for dear life, Darrin Auger inched his way to what could be the biggest soursop in the world. “As I move the
LAWAI — About 20 feet off the ground, with his legs wrapped around a tree and holding on for dear life, Darrin Auger inched his way to what could be the biggest soursop in the world.
“As I move the branch, it’s swinging,” recalled the Lawai resident. “I know that this thing is ripe, and it’s getting ready to drop.”
After about five twists, Auger retrieved the 15-pound fruit off a tree on his landlord’s property two Fridays ago.
“I swear it almost put me out of the tree because it was so heavy,” he said. “It took me probably 15 minutes. I was taking my time; I didn’t want to fall. It was in a hard-to-get-to spot.”
Accompanying Auger was his girlfriend, Minerva Gonzalez.
When she set her eyes on the monster fruit, Auger said her eyes got as “big as golf balls.”
Auger’s find could eclipse the current world record measured on June 8, 2010, in Kona.
That fruit, grown by Ken Verosco in Captain Cook, Hawaii, weighed in at 8.14 pounds with a length of 11.5 inches.
The day after retrieving the monster fruit, Auger and Gonzalez took it to a local grocery store to weigh it.
In front of a large crowd, the massive soursop weighed in at 15.39 pounds.
Not too shabby a find for the Lawai resident, who said he was just checking out his landlord’s property when he discovered the fruit.
Auger said he’s still awaiting word from Guinness World Records after informing the organization about the gigantic soursop.
“It’s ripening now, and it lost about a pound since I first found it,” he said. “I’m getting a little worried no one is really jumping on this quicker.”
Since posting a picture of the fruit on social media, Auger said friends have been asking where he found it.
“I’m not telling anybody where it’s at,” he said.
