From a hilltop farm in Union County, the Lingle family has been selling the best any season has to offer for decades. But it is in fall, with pumpkins of all sizes, that excites Lorene Lingle the most.

"Boy, do we have pumpkins. They are large this year. This has been an excellent growing season for pumpkins and apples," Lingle said.

Lingle, 83, runs the farm at 2025 Water Valley Road, off U.S. 51 South and two miles toward Owl Creek Winery in Cobden, with her son, Henry.

As small business owners and operators, the Lingles rely on their customers' taste for the season, especially the pumpkins. This year's pumpkin offerings are the reddish, flat Cinderellas, whites, the smaller pies, minis and a cornucopia of decorative, turban, swan and apple gourds, straw bales and apples.

The Lingles' farm is just one contributing to the estimated 43,200 acres of ground used to grow pumpkins in the U.S. last year, with the crop valued at $117 million, according to the United States Department of Agriculture. But Illinois stands out, particularly near Peoria.

Cornering the market

More than 90 percent of the country's crop last year was grown within a 90-mile radius of Peoria, with nearby Morton the home of Libby's pumpkin processing plant.

But one of the nation's largest pumpkin operations is here in Southern Illinois, at Frey Farms in Keenes, east of Mount Vernon.

Company president Sarah Frey-Talley said roughly 750 acres of her family's 1,200-acre farm is used for growing pumpkins. They also contract with growers for an additional 750 acres.

This single farm accounts for 12 percent of the state's pumpkin acreage, according to the Illinois Department of Agriculture.

So what happens to all the Frey pumpkins? Most - about 1 million this year - go to the nation's largest retailer, Wal-Mart. But nearly all the other pumpkins go to Morton.

While ornamental pumpkins for jack-o-lanterns are what land on porches, the pale processing pumpkins are comparable in size and shape to a watermelon and are what go into canned pumpkin and pumpkin pie mix. According to the University of Illinois, more than 85 percent of the world's pumpkin crop is processed in Morton at Libby's facility.

After Illinois, the top producing states for pumpkins are Ohio, California, New York and Pennsylvania.

Following pumpkin roots

Pumpkins are native to the Americas and are members of the gourd family, which includes watermelon, cucumbers and zucchini squash. Pumpkins are grown in nearly every state.

Worldwide, the Food and Agriculture Organization's database indicates China is the leading producer of pumpkins, squash and gourds, with 28 percent of the annual world output. The U.S. ranked fifth, at 4 percent of world production, just behind Russia and the Ukraine.

Popular types include the Howden Field variety, an industry standard for 15- to 25-pound orange, jack-o-lantern pumpkins.

Most of the award-winning, 1,000-pound pumpkins are versions of the Atlantic Giant variety.

The standard pie-type, small, orange pumpkins are the New England Pie variety, which average about 5 pounds each.

Pumpkin patch recipe

There's more to growing pumpkins than sun, water, earth and seed.

Pumpkins also require bees for proper pollination and fruit set, so most growers rent one or two bee colonies per acre, a cost that can hit more than $100 each, states the USDA Economic Research Service.

And within the three-month harvest window, U.S. growers pick more than 1.45 billion pounds of pumpkins - that's roughly equal to 5 pounds of pumpkin per capita nationwide.

After Halloween and the strong focus on the ornamental use of pumpkins, the holiday period that begins with Thanksgiving turns the spotlight toward the food uses of pumpkins.

Although the most popular food use remains traditional pumpkin pie, other food uses include bread, muffins, pudding, custards, soup, stuffing and roasted seeds.

Strains of hull-less pumpkin seeds may eventually lead to increased demand for use in foods such as granola, trail mix and other snacks, USDA market experts project.

The popularity of urban pumpkin patches, fall festivals and ornamental use of pumpkins in homes and businesses have all helped to increase demand over the past 20 years.

karenbinder@verizon.net

Pump up with pumpkins

Their bright orange color is an obvious clue that pumpkins are stuffed with an important antioxidant, beta-carotene.

Beta-carotene is one of the plant carotenoids converted to Vitamin A in the body. In the conversion to Vitamin A, beta-carotene performs many important functions in overall health.

Current research indicates that a diet rich in foods containing beta-carotene may reduce the risk of developing certain types of cancer and offers protection against heart disease as well as some degenerative aspects of aging.

Here are the nutritional facts for 1 cup of cooked pumpkin without salt:

Calories: 49

Protein: 2 grams

Carbohydrates: 12 grams

Dietary fiber: 3 grams

Calcium: 37 mg

Iron: 1.4 mg

Magnesium: 22 mg

Potassium: 564 mg

Zinc: 1 mg

Selenium: .50 mg

Vitamin C: 12 mg

Niacin: 1 mg

Folate: 21 mcg

Vitamin A: 2650 IU

Vitamin E: 3 mg

(The following fun facts list should be used as an info box, of sorts, with possibly a pumpkin screen background.)

Pumpkin Quick Facts

* About 90 to 95 percent of the processed pumpkins in the United States are grown in Illinois.

* Pumpkins are used as feed for animals.

* Pumpkin flowers are edible.

* The largest pumpkin pie ever made was more than 5 feet in diameter and weighed more than 350 pounds. It used 80 pounds of cooked pumpkin and took six hours to bake.

* In colonial times, pumpkins were used as an ingredient for the crust of pies, not the filling.

* Pumpkins were once recommended for removing freckles and curing snake bites.

* The largest pumpkin ever grown weighed 1,140 pounds.

* The name pumpkin originated from "pepon" - the Greek word for "large melon."

* Pumpkins are 90 percent water.

* Pumpkins are fruit.

* Eighty percent of the pumpkin supply in the United States is available in October.

* Colonists sliced off pumpkin tops, removed seeds and filled the insides with milk, spices and honey. This was baked in hot ashes and is the origin of pumpkin pie.

* Native Americans flattened strips of pumpkins, dried them and made mats.

* Native Americans called pumpkins "isqoutm squash."

* Native Americans used pumpkin seeds for food and medicine.