How to donate your old Jack-o'-lantern for a good cause

Halloween may be over, but your Jack-o'-lantern could still be of use to someone.

Instead of throwing it in the garbage, the Ottawa South Eco-Action Network (OSEAN) is encouraging you to drop it off at one of their many drop-off locations in Ottawa.

"In the week following Halloween, we collect carved and intact pumpkins in Ottawa South and connect them with local farms and kitchens. In doing so, we combat food insecurity while diverting them from the city compost facility and the landfill," the group says on its website.

Called Pumpkins for the Planet, pumpkins dropped off will find new life in local kitchens for food like pies, and carved jack-o-lanterns will become food for animals at farms.

Katrina Rogers-Stewart dropped off her family's two pumpkins on Saturday at their Ernie Calcutt Park drop off location. She says it’s a great initiative.

“It’s pretty neat that they go to the animals," she says. "And there are so many pumpkins that we may as well do something with them.”

Organizer Marianne Ariganello says it began small six years ago, letting people drop off pumpkins in her front yard so it could be brought to farms.

“It’s wild. It’s super fun to see my tiny little idea has grown to such a huge event,” she explains.

Now the goal is to get more than 2,500 pumpkins to go to more than a dozen organizations and farms.

"It’s great to think we really are helping our neighbours with this," says Ariganello. "Because all of these pumpkins are either going to go to farms to reduce their costs, because they don’t have to pay to feed their animals so much. Or it’s going to go to food centres and it’s going to fill those hungry bellies."

It’s such an easy thing to do but it’s going to have such a great impact on so many.”

Pumpkins donated to OSEANs Pumpkins for the Planet initiative on Saturday. (Kimberley Johnson/CTV News Ottawa)

There are 16 drop-off locations in Ottawa for OSEAN's Pumpkins for the Planet program, including three in Gloucester-Southgate Ward, eight in River Ward, and five in Alta Vista Ward.

The pumpkins will be distributed to several local farms and organizations.

There will also be a free Pumpkin Alley Fun Day event Sunday from 1 to 3:30 p.m. at Earnie Calcutt Park on Springland Drive. There will be face-painting and kids' activities, a scavenger hunt, firefighters with Obi the Dalmation, Capital Ghostbusters and hot chocolate, alongside piles of Jack-o'-lanterns that will be headed to local farms.

Ariganello says there will be events for kids, and people can bring donations to support the Brookfield Community cupboard.

“We’re using pumpkins as a gateway fruit into food security and food waste and kind of making it a lot more fun to talk about,” says Ariganello.

Karen Auston with the Brookfield Community Cupboard says the donations are welcome when food insecurity has peaked for so many families.

"It means we can keep our food cupboards open,” she says. "It's an opportunity for the community to get together and have a lot of fun and (OSEAN are) doing good things for the organizations such as us, to keep them going."

You can drop your pumpkin off at this event. It is also accepting cash or non-perishable food donations for the Brookfield Community Food Cupboard.

For more details about Pumpkins for the Planet, visit OSEAN's website.