The pumpkin store sold them just outright, but that was not the attraction. The green 6620 John Deere tractors with the hay rack on the back was the main attraction. To get a ride out into the 60 acres of pumpkin vines. Pumpkins everywhere. All varieties. White ones, green ones, yellow ones and of course the standard orange ones.
Some of them were as large as three feet around. You picked out the pumpkins that you wanted and loaded them on the hay rack and then you rode back to the scale. 30 cents a pound, plus tax.
The hay rack ride was free. Well until you paid for the pumpkins.
They were hauling the pumpkins out with wheel borrows. There were chickens and roosters crowing. There were slides into big piles of hay. There was a maze made out of big round bales. You could have been lost in there for hours but the kids were running as fast as they could and it didn't take too long and they came out the other end.
They had a pumpkin chucking shed where you got to throw the pumpkins at targets out in a field. Two small pumpkins for a dollar. See about the cows below to find out how they get cleaned up.
Now about the steers that were quietly eating something orange. Ya, pumpkins.
When the field freezes and the the pumpkins are no longer able to be sold. They turn the cows and steers into the fields. They clean up the entire field. All 60 acres. When they are done, there isn't a pumpkin in sight.
They make the whole years income all in one month. I'll bet there were 200 kids out there just this afternoon. I counted six school buses. Ten acres of parking for the cars. There were 4 tractor hay rack drivers and about 6 gals running the cash registers.
I always like to figure out the scheme for every thing, not that I want to open a pumpkin farm but it is just interesting to see a successful business that you hadn't thought of.
