Construction worker and farming enthusiast Leslie Trott has produced a massive nine-and-a-half-pound sweet potato.

Mr. Trott, who has a garden across the street from his Trinity Church Road, Hamilton Parish house, said that he did not realise that the vegetable had grown quite so large until he pulled it out of the soil.

"I decided to pull them up because the soil looked really dry and the bugs were beginning to eat the tops of the plants," he said. "This is the first time that one of my sweet potatoes has grown so large.

"I grow them from slips (cuttings or stems) and I don't do anything special to them. "It is hard to say whether some of the others will be larger than this one - I will have to pull up the other ones."

Mr. Trott, 43, has decided that he will "look at" his sweet potato for a while, rather than cooking it.