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Ontario

I have a question regarding the official method of recording a tomatoes weight if it has more than 2 decimal places. We have a tomato contest in our club (GVGO) and I have been running it since we lost Mike Demars (Zeke) in 2022. Our contest allows home scales if the growers want or they can find a certified scale. I ask for pictures of the tomato on the scale with the weight visible. Sometimes growers send me tomatoes with the weight in kg and sometimes it is lbs. /oz. I just convert the weight to lbs. For instance, I recently had a grower send me an entry that was 3.028 kg on a certified scale. So I multiply 3.028 X 2.20462 to get 6.67558936 lbs. I remember Zeke telling me a few years ago that if the 3rd decimal place is 5 or higher he would round up the weight to 6.68lb. That is what I have been doing for this contest. So what I am asking, is this the proper way to record the weight?
Thanks for your opinions.
Bob MacKenzie

8/25/2023 2:39:18 PM

Central NY

Good ol Zeke…always trying to nickel and dime every last ounce…I think the math checks out though. Best of luck to all the growers the rest of the way. I’m sure Zeke is checkin in on all of us from above. Grow em big!!!

8/25/2023 6:06:29 PM

Grittyville, WA

Read the rules for the 150 sq ft contest I believe over there they are rounding down. I dont know whether digital scales round up or down to begin with. So its hard to know which method is fairest.

As a general rule in math, rounding up is fine. But depending if the digital scales people are using already round up or down, it could create a scenario where slightly smaller tomatoes would tie with slightly larger larger ones.

I think in the fairy tale "Snow White and the 7 Dwarfs" thats the real problem the evil queen was having? Really what she was asking: "Mirror, mirror, on the wall... Who has the fairest giant vegetable weighing contest, of them all?"

8/25/2023 10:00:00 PM

San Diego, CA

For the Zeke Tomato Team Challenge hosted here on BP, we follow the widely accepted rule... if the number being rounded is followed by 5, 6, 7, 8, or 9, round the number up.

We are rounding to the hundredth as well. Zeke was 100% correct, IMHO.

8/25/2023 11:26:56 PM

Ontario

Thank you all for your input. I have decided to carry on with the way Saswampo describes above. That is what Zeke did. I just wanted to confirm that I was doing things correctly. Good growing everyone!

8/26/2023 2:53:27 PM