This year's pumpkin crop in Illinois is smaller than usual both in number and the size of the pumpkins because of the drought in the central United States.

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The Chicago Sun-Times reports that because of dry hot weather the pumpkins matured about three weeks early.

"It's like the drought stunted the beginning of the growth," Dorothy Putnam, owner of the Pumpkin Patch in Barrington, told the newspaper.

Illinois is the country's largest producer of pumpkins. Most of them end up in pies, but a few of them are destined for glory as Halloween jack o' lanterns.

David Bengtson, owner of Bengtson's Pumpkin Festival in Homer Glen, said he did his buying this year in Ohio. Bengtson likes to have a stock with an average weight of 20 pounds or more so that buyers looking for those really big pumpkins can find them. The Illinois loads he looked at averaged 14 pounds.

On the bright side, Illinois pumpkins this year are high quality, with few problems with fungus diseases.