Behind the Scenes: Pumpkin Pick-Up Photography

The red step-side pick-up truck has captured my heart! It hollers vintage rural America without saying a word. This do-it-all vehicle of the day hauled everything: lumber, furniture, hay, and that smelly, organic fertilizer produced by farm animals! Like many others, I’ve fallen in love with the red step-side pick-up truck. My backyard critters absolutely needed it for a toy. And so, the behind-the-scenes story of the little red step-side pick-up truck begins

It just so happens that Tonka made the perfect red 1955 pick-up truck complete with round fenders. I watched eBay. The prices made me cringe. In excellent condition, the price could be $495! Some trucks had been reconditioned with the perfect paint job. Mine needed to show some wear. The perfect pick-up was priced “reasonably” at about $110. This little vehicle was gonna give the critters and I a lot of fun for the money!

What do pick-up trucks do in fall? They haul loads of pumpkins! I visited several roadside stands to find the smallest pumpkins available. Even the smallest pumpkins looked ginormous in the bed of the truck. As the story would go, the pumpkins were prize-winners at the local country fair. ;-)

How should I cover the feeding platform? A small patch of grass might look like an overgrown field. Yellow leaves were already sprinkling the woods around our home. The size and color made them perfect. The pumpkin stems looked a little bare. The tiny leaves of a wild grapevine dressed it up a bit. Dainty black-eyed Susan’s echoed sunflowers. The teeny-tiniest of leaves was placed in the middle of the red hood. Tiny details add so much delight!

Food was easy to hide. The bed of the pick-up could carry a huge haul of black-oil sunflower seeds. Now I just had to get the visitors to go where I wanted. I left a trail of seeds from the edge of the platform to the back of the truck. The trail led up little wooden steps so the bird or critter would be sure to see all the deliciousness being hauled. Photos are most interesting when the wildlife is interacting with the scene. Sunflower seeds were attached to the front edge of the bed to entice the critters to the front. Some were also added to the pumpkin stem.

The pick-up truck was bought at the perfect time. Fall was coming-on and the chippies were hard at work. They’d load their cheeks almost to bursting and scurry back to their burrow. (I wonder how they unload their cheeks. Is it one giant sneeze that spews them out all over the place? Is it like machine gun fire? Probably something a whole lot less dramatic. But I digress….)

I imagined how my little chipmunk friend would “pose”.  The pick-up was hauling TWO pumpkins. Chippy was going to put a front paw on each of the pumpkins and be “king of the pumpkins” on top of the heap! That was kind of like what he did for me in Pumpkin Delights.

Chippy performed perfectly! …with one little snafu. The pumpkin at the back of the truck got in the way of easy-access to the sunflower seeds. An adult chippy weighs about five ounces. Little pumpkins weigh about six ounces. It was chippy versus the great pumpkin. I guess when there’s food involved, that’s not much of a challenge for a chipmunk. Chippy pushed the pumpkin off the back of the truck and finished loading his cheeks! My eyes got huge and I chuckled.  As soon as he scurried away, I hurriedly replenished the seeds before he returned. Yep…He did it again…and again….

Eventually, as cute as he was, I wanted to get the photo I imagined. The pick-up truck was going to haul TWO pumpkins. I cinched light wire around the middle of the pumpkin. The wire went behind the pumpkins and attached with an S-hook to the cab of the pick-up. The wire was out of sight. There was no way chippy would push it off! Chippy pushed and pushed. He found the S-hook. He pushed it up. The pumpkin was heaved off the truck and chippy happily went about stuffing his cheeks. I was outsmarted by a hungry chipmunk. …and I don’t mind. He gave me so many cute photos for all of us to enjoy. There are seven of them below!

Smiles!

Shop here for “Pumpkin Pickup” – https://azarelgreetings.com/store/place-holder-k/
Shop here for “Pumpkin Delights” – https://azarelgreetings.com/store/pumpkin-delights/