The Post-Halloween Spirit

Halloween is the most community-based holiday on the calendar. We unlock our gates. We answer, happily, when our doorbells ring. We walk our neighborhoods – at night! – and send our children to say “hi” and “trick or treat” and “please” and “thank you” to our neighbors.

And really, isn’t that evening of trick or treating just the entire community, or “village” as the famous quotation has it, teaching children about social interaction?

In October of 2020, in the midst of the Covid pandemic, Canh-Lien Nguyen was home with her newborn daughter, but she still wanted to make the holiday festive. She bought a lot of pumpkins at a local church’s pumpkin patch, but after Halloween, “I waited too long to take them to the City of Houston pumpkin drop-off locations,” she remembers. (See the list at the end of this story for where to donate pumpkins.)

Not wanting to throw them in the garbage, she asked on social media where she might donate them. Many leads did not pan out, but someone mentioned a farm in Liberty, Texas called the Triangle B Ranch. Canh-Lien got in touch with Michelle Lumpkin-Browning, owner, with her husband Vincent Browning, of the ranch.

Liberty, Texas is a little over an hour’s drive from Houston. Canh-Lien, with her newborn daughter, couldn’t make the drive. “Michelle then offered me a deal,” Canh-Lien says. “If I could round up neighbors to donate a truckload, she and her husband Vincent could make the two-and-a half-hour round trip. From then, I was on a mission to not have to make the drive myself.”

Michelle Lumpkin-Browning with calf Cassius.

Farm animals, and even dogs, love to eat pumpkin; it’s also nutritious, good for their digestion, and can even act as a natural dewormer.

Canh-Lien posted on the local social-media site Nextdoor a few days before Thanksgiving that people could drop pumpkins off in her yard. “When I came home on Sunday from visiting family,” she says, “my front yard and curbside were filled with pumpkins.” Michelle and Vincent ended up making three trips with their truck.

Canh-Lien, Michelle, and Vincent have done it every year since. “If we ever move, there may need to be a stipulation in our house’s HAR listing that you have to collect pumpkins for the animals of the Triangle B,” jokes Canh-Lien.

Luckily, she says, “It takes very little effort on my end.” She puts up a few social-media reminders, starting in mid-October, “and that’s it,” she says, “unless I catch Michelle and Vincent when they come to pick up and then I help them load the truck.”

Vincent and Michelle have begun arriving with a trailer and sometimes have to make seven or eight trips in a season. Canh-Lien estimates that at least 4,000 pumpkins have been kept out of landfills and been given as treats to the animals of the Triangle B and the nearby animal rescue, K-9 Airlift Rescue Barn.

And what cool new friends Canh-Lien has made! Vincent is a retired champion bull rider. He and Michelle breed Ankole-Watusi cattle, one of the oldest breeds of cattle, going back 5,000 years, which have some of the largest horns of any animal in the world. (You can see some Watusi at the Houston Zoo.)

Vincent Browning with Oliver and an Oliver plushie.

But Vincent and Michelle have a host of other animals as well, almost all rescues. They have other cattle and also pigs and chickens and sheep and a new guinea pig (“She’s getting fat; I hope she’s not pregnant,” says Michelle) and guinea hens and peacocks and five dogs and seven horses, including three minis (Jack and Nesta and their baby Janice), and a cat. All the animals but the cat love eating the pumpkins they get.

“I’m not trying to get more animals, we have enough,” says Michelle. She pauses. “But if something comes along….”

The most famous resident at Triangle B is Oliver the Watusi, a 21-year-old Watusi steer whose horns measure almost 10 feet from tip to tip and are over 26 inches each in diameter. Oliver is a gentle giant, hand-raised by Vincent, who even used to saddle him up and ride him in parades. Oliver recently retired. Last month was his last as the mascot on the Texas Motorplex in Ennis, where his fans could buy a plushie toy made in his likeness. Oliver has received two million likes on TikTok and has thousands of followers on his social-media platforms.

He first went viral in 2019 when Vincent and Melissa led him into a Petco, the pet store with the policy of welcoming “any domesticated, licensed, vaccinated companion animals” into its stores. Oliver dipped his horns slightly to fit through the automatic doors of the entrance and then enjoyed the pets and scratches of the Petco customers and employees. Petco posted about the visit on its own social media: “We mean it when we say ALL leashed pets are welcome in our stores. We got a special visit from one of our favorite customers, Oliver the African Watusi!”

It's good to connect.

PUMPED FOR PUMPKINS Pumpkins are a special – and nutritious – treat for animals. Oliver chows down on a pumpkin. 

Where to donate pumpkins

Pumpkins donated for animals to eat need to be uncarved, unpainted, and untreated with any chemicals, such as bleach.

For Oliver and the Triangle B, pumpkins can be donated from Nov. 1-Dec. 1 by the “Little Gardener” mural at the corner of Rural and Quinn Streets next to the staff parking lot of Travis Elementary School.

They can also be donated year-round any day of the week at the Memorial Villages Farmers Market at 10840 Beinhorn, at the base of the market’s “pumpkin tree” in a park space at the center of the market. These pumpkins “go to no less than nine different farmers,” says LeeAnne Carlson, co-manager of the market, “and may feed goats, chickens, cows, or pigs and actually end up nourishing the animals that provide the milk and eggs that show up at the market every week.” 

Pumpkins for Pigs keeps an online national database of the contact information of farms and animal sanctuaries that welcome pumpkin donations for their animals. Several are within an hour’s drive of Houston. 

Pumpkins can also be donated to be composted for use in local parks.

Although exact details weren’t available as of press time for this year, the City of Houston accepts whole pumpkins, jack o’ lanterns, seeds and pulp, with all decorations removed, for composting at some of its locations. Information can be found at the city’s solid-waste management page here.

Residents of West University Place can donate their uncarved pumpkins for composting from Nov. 3-Dec. 1 by placing them curbside with yard waste. Large pumpkins can be left unbagged; smaller ones may be bagged, using Kraft Paper or compostable bags, with other yard waste.

Bellaire residents can bring their “bare” pumpkins for composting to The City of Bellaire Pumpkin Compost Drop-Off from Nov. 1-Dec. 14, 2025. Place pumpkins in the collection container at 4401 Edith St., the corner of Edith and Baldwin Ave. Pumpkins placed at the curb for regular trash pick-up will not be recycled.

On Saturday, Nov. 8, from 3-6 p.m., the Woodlands Township Environmental Services Department will be holding its annual Pumpkin Smash at the Sterling Ridge Park and Ride at 8001 McBeth Way in the Woodlands. Participants can fling their pumpkins in a catapult, get after them with a baseball bat, or watch them go splat from an 80-foot drop. Participants can also talk with local composting experts about composting at home.

Where to donate candy

I have to admit, as a young trick-or-treater, I was appalled when my dentist offered to take my candy. “He’s going to throw it out?” thought this budding candy-lover.

But no, dentists and other businesses that “buy back” Halloween candy are often working with organizations, such as Operation Gratitude, Operation Shoebox, Troopathon, and Soldiers’ Angels, that put the candy into care boxes they send to soldiers stationed overseas, military veterans, and first-responders.

So, if you’re willing to part with your candy, check with your dentist and other local businesses.

Also, the RMHC Greater Houston Charities accept individually wrapped candy or whole bags of candy to have for families staying at the Ronald McDonald House facilities in Houston. They ask for no individual candies wrapped in paper, such as Starbursts or Tootsie Rolls. Candy can be dropped off Monday through Friday from 10 a.m.-6 p.m. at the Ronald McDonald House at 1907 Holcombe Blvd.

Or if you, like me, plan to eat yourself silly on your Halloween candy, you can still donate your candy wrappers for recycling at the Trick or Treat Box in the Public Works Administration Office at 3826 Amherst St. in West U.