Legends of the Fall

-Posted by Isaac

It's that time of year again.

Mid October, Pickaway County-- the schools shut down, the routes change, and everyone makes a pilgrimage to Circleville. Everyone in the state it seems, young and old.
The Pumpkin Show, now in it's 108th year sort of puts Circleville on the map.

I wish I had thought to take more photos of the general festival. There are rides everywhere, exhibits everywhere, pumpkin food every which way you turn, demonstrations,

and of course the people-watching is excellent.
Maybe I'll capture some of this next year.

I did however get a few pictures of Circleville's version of overdoing it.
Some of the GIANTS....

The mutants...

The winners, spawned of Pickaway county soil...

"In Umerica we call'em taters."

Talk about a tough one to judge...

There are pies,

...and then there are PIES.

Even the insects are gigantic.

Dr. Bob Liggett, our family eye doctor, seems to be a perpetual name in the winner's circle.

Here, size matters.

1,964 pounds this  year. I think this was a Pumpkin Show record.
I'd love to claim that this beast was pollinated by one of my bees but I'm pretty sure Dr. Liggett handles that job himself.

Cicleville isn't the only pumpkin crazy town. I happened to flip through this week's TIME Magazine and found out that there are alot of pumpkin festivals:

But I'll wager ours is the biggest.

Anywhere a lot of pumpkins are planted, there will eventually be a need for bees.

We did pollination work for three different pumpkin farms this summer. The number of hives required varies with the size of farm but it usually runs around one hive for every two acres of pumpkins. The bees work from mid June through September. And they don't make a lot of honey. (Which is why I charge more for pumpkin pollination.)

On Friday I got the last load home. We now have a giant home apiary-- 45 hives in the back yard to keep us company this winter.

This is our own version of overdoing it.