With the Halloween season now over, Joe Fidler of Aurora decided last Saturday morning it was time his family’s pumpkins found a new home.

“This is a great. It’s going to be fun to just smash, and it’s better than throwing them away in the trash,” Fidler said as he and his two sons got ready to break up some pumpkins during a pumpkin smash event Saturday in Aurora. “We live just around the corner and this was nice and convenient for us. We’re going to take these bats they gave us, warm up and here we go.”

The event was part of the annual pumpkin recycling efforts offered by the Addison-based SCARCE group, an environmental education nonprofit that began organizing and promoting pumpkin smash events in Illinois in 2014.

SCARCE founder and Director Kay McKeen said there were four location

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