"Pumpkin picking" WTF

[HauntedGusset]

Driving home from a visit to family today there was an absolutely massive traffic jam caused by cars entering/leaving a farm shop that also has a small events centre attached. I last passed the farm shop a few weeks ago and they had some other event on with cars parked all over the field nearest the road. Anyway today the same field was covered in huge pumpkins with families trudging round in the mud "picking" them - but they didn't grow there, they can't have done as the same field was a car park last month They've just been plonked there. Someone tell me why this is a thing?

(And no, I don't have small DC anymore so I suppose I've missed this becoming popular, I was vaguely aware people pick pumpkins but imagined it to be like picking strawberries where you actually pick them fresh from the plant, not like a crapper muddier version of just buying one from Lidl!)

It is pumpkin picking. Picking also means choosing. Like a tree at Christmas. Or picking which pumpkin you’d like from the box at Tesco. Our local patch is grown on site but cut in advance, still in the same spot though. Kids love it.

I never said it was responsible for the failings of humanity, just symptomatic of a very individualistic and self indulgent attitude in general. The animals that WE treasure and can turn into some kind of extension of ourselves (fur babies 🤮) are treated better than many humans and the rest of the animal kingdom is generally treated appallingly through factory farming, habitat loss etc. The pet industry is now a massive global industry and significant contributor to global warming and resource depletion. And a large proportion of that industry is pure indulgence and in no way necessary to the animals actual welfare. It is far more about the human owners and their needs. I don't think the kind of attitudes towards pets I read about on here regularly are good for humankind or animals because it tries to turn dogs in particular into something theyre not.

It's OK not to like pumpkin picking and not to want to take a dog to one. You don't need to make up a ridiculous collapse-of-society justification for it.

Maybe the dog just enjoyed a good sniff around? It's hardly the end of days.

I was a naysayer but this year went with a toddler contingent and they loved running around in the mud and the wheelbarrows. I even put a picture up on Instagram- basic bitch that I am! A bit miffed we has to pay to get in so next year we will go to a smaller, free one. Our small pumpkin will be made into soup.

Honestly it was cheaper than soft play and we got outside. I took that as a win!

Mine are a bit older now, but we used to go to a big field where they do pick your own. We always used to leave the pumpkins until late October and they were past their best. A bit smashed in or rotting. Very halloweeny though.

Many farms do grow them. The farm I visited does, and they do a lot of good stuff to improve the local area.

I have two children of the target age. I just don’t get it - it feels super fake. That said, I have trudged down a field (as part of a wider day out), and ‘picked’ a pumpkin this year! It’s such a weird concept.

our local farm does pumpkin picking. they are definitely grown there as they give you secateurs to cut them with. plus wheelbarrows, bales, photo opp next to a tractor. and no entry fee! between £3-5 for a large pumpkin. It was lovely!

i cant imagine paying to pick one up from a muddy carpark or dumped in a muddy field.

Load of English people (who historically don't celebrate Halloween as opposed to November 5th) commenting on this thread.

"american nonsense"

Halloween is 100% Celtic (Irish/Scots).

*The hollowed out lantern (in my youth (late 1980s) we picked turnips)
*Guising (short for disguising), in costume (mask is called a "false face") going door to door for food
*Bonfire (collecting wood everyone did)
*Fireworks (sparklers was big as a kid, bit older it became bangers)
*Apple bobbing (tub of water, get apple out with mouth)

Zero of my Halloween had anything to do with North America. All the practices come from here. There has just been two alterations to the one we already practiced since, pumpkins instead of turnips (easier to carve, and look better), and since the 2000s the interjection "trick or treat" (a phrase from Ontario, Canada btw hence "american" is even more ludicrous) when out guising (side note: according to the Irish Times "help the Halloween party" was the most popular interjection prior to the 2000s).

Picking out a Christmas tree from the garden centre=picking out a pumpkin from a supermarket.

Picking up a pumpkin that someone has harvested and then put in a different field=picking out a Christmas tree that someone has cut down and then pushed into the ground in a different field.

I’ve been to a couple of these, they were grown by the farms we went to but brought to a more accessible field and strewn about amongst hay bales, decorations etc. my kids loved stomping about in the mud, climbing bales and driving the wheelbarrow. Hot chocolate at the end, happy kids in fresh air, what’s not to like? I took a few photos to show the grandparents and to add to our family photo book at the end of the year. Pretty sad if you have an issue with it (not OP as such but read some pretty judgey comments about it)

It's the notion of dogs enjoying activities that we do, or us telling ourselves they do that baffles me. So far as I can tell, my dog enjoys running, catching sticks, peeing against things and sniffing other dogs asses.

I'm not sure why dogs enjoying being out in the countryside running around is such a tricky concept though? My dog enjoys that and doesn't get to do it very often as we live in the middle of the city.

For me, it’s no different than going to buying one from a shop where the kid picks it out - it’s obviously just much more fun (it’s also good exercise).

The same as conkers or pine cones.

You can buy these in the shops too but it’s more fun to find them and choose them.
(Obviously these are free).

A farm near us had one with pumpkins actually growing and other fun stuff for children. £3 per person/pumpkin, very pretty surroundings - not bad I thought!

It's for people too stupid to grow their own because it would ruin their precious lawn.

I'm English and we followed many of those traditions at Halloween when I was a child, as did my mother when she was a child in the fifties. We made lanterns from swedes, had a party with a bonfire and sparklers, apple bobbing and various other food-based games. Halloween may well have been originally Celtic but the traditions existed in England for some time before American practices crept in.

🤣🤣🤣
WTF!!

Does that also apply to people who buy pumpkins in supermarkets?

In fact, does that further apply to anyone who buys any vegetables ever?

I think this has just pipped the "dogs at the pumpkin patch are the collapse of society" person to the post. Congratulations, gold medal to you, but honourable mention for the other person.

Wait for it Red.. a barrage of personal insults will be thrown your way shortly for that one😂😂😂

I had no idea these things are a set up..... assumed because they are so easy to grow that these places set aside less fertile ground to grow them on..... thank god I've not lined any pockets this year....(tbh I'd never pay their prices anyway......a walk down the nearest canal with a stop on the way home at a shop that sells them is just as good an experience IMO.... )

It's for people too stupid to grow their own because it would ruin their precious lawn.

I’ve read some well thought out posts of yours in a variety of topics. And now this? Has your account been hacked? Are you drunk? 🤣

<whispers> I'm not sure if usernames are case sensitive, but if so, I wonder if this is who you think it is...

Thankyou for having the guts to say what we all know. It’s a well known fact that only clever people have vegetable patches. Stupid people have lawns, or worse have yards or even nothing at all! The gall of them utter thickos purchasing vegetables rather than growing them makes me sick.