You may be heading out for your annual trip to the pumpkin patch pretty soon, but some local farmers say inflated expenses and unusual weather have impacted supply and caused prices to rise.
“Normally, we will get a much bigger pumpkin. But this year, we have noticed that they are considerably smaller,” said Steve Jacobsen, owner of The Solvang Farmer Pumpkin Patch.
On Thursday, his pumpkin patch officially opened for the fall season, offering 38 different varieties of the gourd.
“We have got little bitty pumpkins, we have got 300-pound pumpkins, we have got flat pumpkins, blue pumpkins, pink pumpkins, red pumpkins,” he added.
However, Jacobsen says his harvest this year is substantially smaller than in previous years as a result of the mild summer.
“We have only had maybe a week’s worth of above 100-degree weather this year,” Jacobsen said. “For pumpkins and the corn, they need heat to make them want to grow. Otherwise, if it is cool, they will just sit there. They won’t grow.”
Jacobsen says this year alone, the surge in prices for fuel, fertilizer and water have gone up by at least 30%, causing the price of pumpkins to go up as well.
Roughly 20 miles away at Zellers Farms in Lompoc, pumpkin prices have nearly tripled over the past two years.
“A big, large pumpkin like a 30- or 40-pound pumpkin is $20,” said farmer Richard Zellers.
We asked him what prices looked like two years ago: “Three for $20," he said. "My original cards say 3 for $20, and now, there is no way I could even pay my water bill.”
Despite the increased costs, Zellers says this autumn, his harvest is the biggest he has seen in years.
“You could have walked through the fields here; it was almost all dirt. You could barely see the pumpkins,” Zellers said, recalling last year’s harvest.
He says the many weeks of rain this winter actually helped his pumpkins grow.
“We planted a cover crop of fava beans. Some of the farmers, the wiser old guys, told me to do it. I ground them in, and with all the rain, I think it helped that nitrogen and keeps the soil depth wet, and we had a great crop,” Zellers explained.
Both farmers say their pumpkin patches will be open through October, adding that despite the inflated costs and impacts from weather, they are ready for another busy season.
“We have got generation after generation that keeps coming,” Jacobsen told KSBY. “So kids way back when are bringing their families and their grandparents. It just revolves.”
Admission at both Zellers Farms and The Solvang Farmer Pumpkin Patch is free.
