Deformed lime not unusual – official

Ashton Dupont, a restaurant owner from Grenville, Largo Heights made the discovery of his life about a week ago in his kitchen garden.{{more}}

Dupont brought the strangely shaped lime to SEARCHLIGHT’s offices, as he sought answers about its formation.

Dupont said he was picking lime to carry to the restaurant for the next day when he made the discovery.

“My sons were picking up the limes and they say daddy, look at this weird lime. I came down and picked the lime and when I picked it, I saw it looking stranger than the others,” Dupont recounted.

He added that he also saw another lime, which was shaped in the form of a heart.

According to him, the tree was planted about six years ago.

“This is weird. It’s the first time I have ever come across anything looking like this,” he said.

Meanwhile, when contacted, an official in the Ministry of Agriculture, who wanted to remain anonymous, told SEARCHLIGHT that the disfigured lime might have been the result of a lightning strike or a pathogen that would have interrupted the normal growth of the lime.

“When a lime forms, the bud has different parts in it that come together. If something happens that accidentally prevents that from happening, the various parts of the bud would grow out and not mesh together…,” the official explained.

The official further stated that when the lime was cut open, it was evident that the parts did not mesh together.

“It’s just something that happens and happens all the time in fruits, but not really limes in particular. It could have been from all the lightning back in December, because lightning interrupts things like that. If not, a bird could have picked it and injected some pathogen that disrupted it. It could be anything,” the official added.

“There is nothing phenomenal about it.”