Nutrition and Food Systems at the Cattaraugus County Fair

If you’re looking for something different to do at this year’s Cattaraugus County Fair, then head over to the Corporate Building and visit the Cornell Cooperative Extension of Cattaraugus County booth. There will be tons of information and activities for all ages.

One of those activities will be planting pumpkins with our Nutrition and Food System Educator Sheldon Kenyon. Participants will have the opportunity to plant a pumpkin that they will take home. They will also receive instructions on how to care for their pumpkin plant. This is a great way to learn about agriculture and how plants grow.

But the fun doesn’t stop there. If successful, pumpkin growers will be able to grow their own Halloween jack-o-lantern. After Halloween, these scary orange gourds can then be taken to a Pumpkin Smash site where you get to smash your jack-o-lantern and have it added to a compost pile which will then be used in a community or school garden. Not only do you get to have fun smashing your jack-o-lantern and help a community or school garden, but you will also be reducing the number of pumpkins that go to landfills every year where 1.3 billion pounds of discarded pumpkins create methane gas.

So if you’re hot at the fair and need to get out of the heat, come to the Corporate Building and stop in to see Sheldon. Plant a pumpkin, learn how to care for it, get some information on composting, and see what else  Cornell Cooperative Extension of Cattaraugus County has to offer.