Staten Island Man Reveals Secret To Growing Enormous Vegetables
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) -- How does your garden grow?
A Staten Island land homeowner says he has the secret to cultivating giant vegetables.
His inspiration comes from high places, CBS2's Scott Rapoport said.
Every day for an hour or two 84-year-old Joseph Agro ventures into his backyard in Great Kills to tend to his vegetable garden, to create a sort of magic.
Rapoport spent some time with Agro on Monday.
"Everybody knows my vegetables," Agro said.
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You see, what Agro is growing here isn't just vegetables. They are enormous vegetables. Rapoport got a firsthand look at a 5-and-a-half-foot zucchini, a very heavy zucchini.
Then there's the squash, butternut squash, some of them 40 pounds or larger. Agro said he's been doing this here for more than 40 years.
"I love it because it's my favorite thing to do this," Agro said.
Agro said his love of gardening began back in 1950 as a little boy growing up in Sicily, where he learned the old ways, the secrets of gargantuan growing, from his dad. So, of course, CBS2's Rapoport had to ask him what his secret is.
"You got to pray every day. Never miss one day. You miss one day, vegetables might die," Agro said.
Actually, he said the trick is to plant the seeds from his existing vegetables to grow his new ones. Agro said he never uses store-bought seeds,
Growing these massive vegetables is his joy to be sure. Agro's family saidin the couple hours a day he spends in the garden he is in his own special world.
"He would just literally disappear for hours on end," son Peter Agro said.
Joseph's wife, Lilly, unfortunately, does not share the love. Joseph said she hates that her hubby spends so much time in his garden of Eden. She did not want to be interviewed for this story.
Still, it is a labor of love for this energetic octagenarian, his special time in his special place, where a garden grows.
Joseph said he never sells the vegetables. He likes to give them to friends or share with his family.