Will There Be Enough Pumpkins for Halloween After the Hot, Dry Summer?

Every autumn, thousands of people visit pumpkin patches across the United Kingdom to pick pumpkins and enjoy the fall season. But this year, farmers are facing a big problem. The summer of 2026 was the hottest ever recorded in the UK, with records going back to 1884. Because of the extreme heat and very little rain, pumpkins ripened way too early — and farmers are not sure they will last all the way to Halloween.

Richard Jones has farmed at Llynclys Hall Farm near Oswestry, Shropshire, his whole life. He says he has never seen anything like this before. His pumpkins are already ripe, but there are still about two months until Halloween. 'They have matured very early, which is not a good thing because we cannot bring Halloween forward,' he said. Now he has to wait and hope they don't rot before customers come to pick them.

The unusual weather was caused by a very dry and hot summer across England. More than two-thirds of England experienced a drought, meaning there was not nearly enough rain. July 2026 was the driest July recorded since 1836. Jones said pumpkins need both sunshine and some rain to grow well, and this summer they got almost no rain during July and August.

Still, the dry weather did bring some good news for Jones and his farm. Because it was so dry, there was no damp or humid air that usually causes plant diseases. His pumpkins stayed much healthier than in past years because of that. Even weeds had trouble growing, which meant less work for the farmers. 'We've had less weed problems — even the weeds have struggled,' he said.

At Pumpkins R Us in Southam, Warwickshire, farmer Fiona Beards also found her pumpkins fully ripe ahead of schedule. Some pumpkins did not survive the intense heat, but she believes there will still be enough for Halloween shoppers. She explained that the pumpkin plant is surprisingly smart when it comes to surviving tough conditions. 'The pumpkin is a very clever plant — it starts aborting the fruit to keep the plant alive,' she said. If it gets too hot, the plant drops one of its pumpkins so the others can survive.

At Pumpkin Pete's farm in Ledbury, Herefordshire, farmer Ed Godsall has been running a pick-your-own pumpkin patch for nine years. He said that normally, hot and dry summers are actually better for pumpkins than cold and wet ones. 'They're originally from central America, so they do like a bit of heat,' he explained. But this year's heat pushed the plants to their very limit. His farm cannot pump extra water to the crops, so the pumpkins were completely at the mercy of the weather.

Godsall's pumpkins survived, but they are smaller than usual because they didn't get enough water. He also lost some pumpkins early in the season due to heat stress. His biggest worry now is making sure his pumpkins stay fresh until Halloween. He is thinking seriously about the future and whether it would be worth building a water reservoir to irrigate crops during future hot summers. 'We're definitely looking at climate change seriously now, more than we ever have before,' he said.

At Essington Farm in Staffordshire, farmer Richard Simkin described a rollercoaster growing season. His pumpkins started out great, growing fast and strong early in the year. Then, he said, 'we had heatwave after heatwave after heatwave.' Leaves wilted because plants couldn't pull enough water from the dry ground, and some pumpkins were broken open by wildlife searching desperately for water. Despite all this, Simkin says his farm will still have enough pumpkins for customers this Halloween.