This Hallowe’en, North Lincolnshire Council has teamed up with the Recycle Now Home Composting campaign to encourage local residents to make the most of their pumpkins - instead of sending them to landfill sites.

Every year, one million pumpkins are sold across the country and the vast majority are carved into Jack O’ Lanterns for celebrations on 31 October before being tossed into the bin once Halloween is over.

But this Halloween, residents are being reminded that as well as using the shells for carving, they can also make use of the insides of the pumpkins to make many delicious recipes such as pumpkin pie, pumpkin soup or even pumpkin lasagne.

And any bits of the pumpkin that aren’t used – such as the seeds and the old lantern shell – can be put in a home composting bin, where they will break down safely and help provide a nitrogen rich ingredient to make compost.

Councillor Len Foster said recycling old pumpkins after Halloween was ‘a great way of teaching younger members of the family what recycling is all about and why we need to do it’.

l Hints and tips on what can and can’t be recycled – visit the council’s recycling pages, www.northlincs.gov.uk/recycling, call 01724 297000 or email wastemanagement@northlincs.gov.uk.