About 55 000 Blue whales. (That’s quite a lot of Pumpkin.)
October 31, 2014 7:58 AM   Subscribe

Jack O’lanterns: Pumpkins and turnips and fungi, Oh My!, a brief but informative blog post by Kirsty Jackson at Plant Scientist.
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome (9 comments total) 3 users marked this as a favorite
 
So many interesting and seemingly random facts strung together to make a great little article! Fun!
posted by danabanana at 8:31 AM on October 31, 2014 [1 favorite]


MetaFilter: So many interesting and seemingly random facts strung together
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome at 8:39 AM on October 31, 2014


A wander through biology, with a detour through some ethnography, starting from pumpkins.

Well done her. Like a mini James Burke essay.
posted by bonehead at 8:50 AM on October 31, 2014 [1 favorite]


"In 2012 America produced 12.4 Million cwt of Pumpkin1, to put that into a scale we all understand, that is about 55 000 Blue whales!"

Or putting it another way, America's 2012 production of pumpkins exceeded the weight of the entire remaining population of blue whales on this planet by a factor between 4 and 10.
posted by the Real Dan at 8:55 AM on October 31, 2014


sweed if you are from the south of the UK

Swede. And yes: growing up in Essex in the 70s I remember carving swedes for Halloween. (And lighting them with real candles too; wow, that's become a thing of the past only recently.) Pumpkins were more exotic -- like trick-or-treating, an American custom that slowly infiltrated the UK.
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 9:35 AM on October 31, 2014 [1 favorite]


Candles are still normally used in jack-o-lanterns in the US.
posted by Chrysostom at 10:18 AM on October 31, 2014


That little article made me feel really, really stupid:
Legend has it that at this time of year the bridge between the living and the spirit world is at its smallest; and on Halloween spirits and fairies are able to cross over and spend the night walking in the land of the living. But don’t panic this has never been scientifically proven and a good Jack O’lantern will keep you safe. ...
because it had never crossed my mind that the function of the Jack O'lantern might be to scare away the spirits of the dead walking abroad on Halloween night.

Who are generally welcome at our house, by the way, as long as they're willing to refrain from breaking glassware or making the power go out (too often).
posted by jamjam at 11:26 AM on October 31, 2014 [1 favorite]


Candles are still normally used in jack-o-lanterns in the US.

I've seen far more using those little fake LED tealights recently. Might be more of a California thing -- always the drumbeat of fire danger, particularly this drought year.

The other thing I remember of childhood swede-carving: they were small enough, and if you hollowed them out sufficiently light enough, that you could add a string handle and carry the lighted lantern with you.

(But holllowing them out was hard work: turnip/swede is a lot more substantial than pumpkin flesh.)
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 11:55 AM on October 31, 2014 [1 favorite]


I'd want a milling ring and/or a lathe for that work.
posted by bonehead at 12:23 PM on October 31, 2014 [1 favorite]


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