Although it’s great fun to pick your own pumpkin and carve a pumpkin lantern for Halloween, you need to be very careful about what you do with the leftover pumpkin skin, fruit and seeds.
Pumpkins are not native to the UK so there are mixed views on how safe it is to feed them to our native wildlife. Pumpkins are definitely not safe for Hedgehogs to eat as they have a laxative effect on them and can cause dehydration and weight loss just at the time they need to conserve their fat ready for hibernation.
Forestry England strongly advises against leaving your old pumpkins in the countryside as they say that the fruit can be harmful in larger quantities to most wild animals in the UK including deer, birds, badgers and squirrels (yes! pumpkin is a fruit not a vegetable!). There is also the risk of pumpkins that have been decorated with paint, glitter and candles that might also be eaten once the wildlife has developed a taste for it.
In a nutshell, in small quantities, raw pumpkin flesh, seeds and skin can be fed to horses, donkeys and pigs as a good treat 🙂
The main concerns for horses and donkeys are that larger quantities of pumpkin can cause colic, and like other fruit and vegetables, it depends on the general health of the animal as to whether pumpkin might pose a dietary risk. Whilst the fruit itself contains useful vitamins, it also contains sugar and any horses with Equine Metabolic Syndrome (ESM) can react very badly to this sugar.
With pigs, they will love the leftover pumpkins and might even indulge in a football game before tucking in, so a whole pumpkin is entertaining as well as tasty.
Naturally, you must always check that any pumpkin being fed is free of mould as well as any decorations. There is also contamination risk from household knives so only feed pumpkin raw and that has been carefully prepared with very clean knives.
Pumpkin makes a delicious soup – try this lovely vegan recipe and pumkin scones are tasty and unusual.
Don’t forget our wildlife, but do check before feeding them anything unusual or buy some specialised wildlife feeds from a responsible source.
To find out all about health and welfare of donkeys, horses and pet pigs, pop to our Experience pages and come to meet our special little animals and their knowledgeable trainers.
