Illinois Grows The Most Pumpkins – But Just How Many do we Grow?

Pumpkin season is officially on the horizon.

When it comes to pumpkins, Illinois is the place. If you didn't know, Illinois is the number one producer of pumpkins in the entire country. Sure we've got a ton of corn and soybean fields. But when it comes to pumpkins, we REALLY produce a lot of those.

Here are the top 5 states from the list when it comes to farms and acres of pumpkins. Also, notice how Illinois doesn't have the most farms, but the most amount of acres by A LOT.

So even though Illinois only has half the amount of farms as the #2 spot, they have the most acres by far.

So just how many pumpkins does Illinois produce?

420 million pounds of pumpkins produced in Illinois.

The USDA website details -

Illinois harvests the largest share of pumpkin acreage among all States and an even larger share of processing acres. Almost 80 percent of pumpkin acres in Illinois are devoted to pie filling or other processing uses.

Not only do we produce the most pumpkins, but we also have the pumpkin capital. Sure it may be self-proclaimed, but Zippia details -

• Morton, Illinois, is the self-proclaimed “pumpkin capital”, producing 85% of the world’s canned pumpkin.

 

Here's what the whole map looks like -

So when you're indulging in some pumpkin this season, just know it probably came from right here in Illinois.

H/T ZIPPIA