Pumpkin Shortages May Affect East Texas

BULLARD - Finding that just right pumpkin for Halloween can be tough. Now, it’s even tougher. That’s because supply is low and demand is high.

This is due to the amount of heavy downpours west Texas has seen in the past few weeks.

Floyd County, in west Texas, is the number one producer of pumpkins for the state and because of the rain, growers have not been able to grow as many pumpkins.

Leslie Moore owns Moore Farms in Bullard and she says what makes it hard for these farmers are the fact that they irrigate their pumpkins.

She says, “So when they get an enormous amount of rain, its difficult to get in and out of the field to harvest pumpkins and get them packed on trucks and ship them elsewhere to grocery stores and all around the nation.”

Moore says the demand is at an all-time high, not just because of this shortage, but the growing popularity of Halloween itself.

So, are growers here in East Texas suffering because of the rain we’ve received?

Moore says, “I don’t believe it’s affecting anyone in East Texas. Thus so far we haven’t seen results of that although our back fields are quite wet and we can’t get into those to get our pumpkins by the people method.”

Not to worry, as of right now you can still get your pumpkins, but it may be risky to wait too long.

“There’s no telling, but usually on the Sunday that we close, which is next Sunday, we do run out of pumpkins occasionally.”