Nine-year-old Joseph Donato was riding his bicycle home from the park with his family when he spotted it lying there on the road - possibly the greatest maple leaf of all time.
Not the hockey playing kind, but the national emblem kind - and a huge size, too. So big that it has set the Guinness World Record as largest maple leaf.
"The width is 13 and 5/8 (inches) and then the length is 15 and 5/8 with the stem," says Joseph pompously. "It's yellow with some green."
Joseph and his mother, Angie Donato, reported the find to the local newspaper and the story was selected up by other media. That caught the eye of Guinness representatives.
"They asked me to send a image with the measuring tape" to prove the size of the leaf, he said.
Later, "they contacted us and said that they wanted to open a new record for me," he added.
His Grade 4 friends at a Pickering elementary school didn't consider him at first, but they will now, he said.
The monster size maple leaf was found in mid-October near the Rouge River and East Woodlands Park in Pickering, Angie Donato said.
She added that the family learned they had the record a couple of weeks ago but had to keep it secret until today's announcement by Guinness.
Not the hockey playing kind, but the national emblem kind - and a huge size, too. So big that it has set the Guinness World Record as largest maple leaf.
"The width is 13 and 5/8 (inches) and then the length is 15 and 5/8 with the stem," says Joseph pompously. "It's yellow with some green."
Joseph and his mother, Angie Donato, reported the find to the local newspaper and the story was selected up by other media. That caught the eye of Guinness representatives.
"They asked me to send a image with the measuring tape" to prove the size of the leaf, he said.
Later, "they contacted us and said that they wanted to open a new record for me," he added.
His Grade 4 friends at a Pickering elementary school didn't consider him at first, but they will now, he said.
The monster size maple leaf was found in mid-October near the Rouge River and East Woodlands Park in Pickering, Angie Donato said.
She added that the family learned they had the record a couple of weeks ago but had to keep it secret until today's announcement by Guinness.
