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KERNERSVILLE — Near the pecan tree with the tire swing, up the hill from where Ladybug  grazes in a back pasture, Logan  Taylor is struggling with a pumpkin.

The thing is nearly as big as he is. And really, it’s a pain to push. You can tell by his contorted face. But Logan doesn’t care. He’s 4 . And like any boy who’s 4, he loves an adventure.

 He’s outside with his mom, and he knows he’ll get to smash that pumpkin with a shovel and feed it to the 50 chickens  his mom raises within a shout of their house.

And the chickens will leave nothing but the pumpkin shell.

That’s no surprise. Kim Taylor’s chickens will eat everything. The surprise comes when you ask Kim how she found these pumpkins that Logan is so desperately trying to push up a hill.

She got them from the Internet, after posting an ad on Craigslist.org , the cyberspace flea market. You’ll find just about everything there.

Including a request for leftover pumpkins.

“Is it time to pitch the pumpkins?’’ she wrote. “Let me know, and I’ll pick them up. I’ll feed them to my chickens.’’

I admit, I love pumpkins — the harbinger of fall, the orange orb of Halloween, the sweet taste of my favorite craft beer.

But right now, my front-porch pumpkin is a rotting mess. Yours may be, too, if it’s still on your stoop a few weeks after Halloween.

When I heard about Kim’s ad, I thought, “Huh?’’

Her friends did, too.

“They think I’m silly,’’ Kim says. “They say, 'You’re doing what with the pumpkins?’ Then, there’s my one friend who said, 'I can’t believe you’re giving the pumpkins to the chickens!’

“But after they see them eating, they understand. My chickens love it.’’

And Kim loves that. She’s 35 , a married mother of two  who works from home selling pharmaceuticals to area veterinarians .

Like many mothers, she’s learned how to stretch a dollar.

That’s how she discovered Craigslist.  Eighteen months ago, she started searching in cyberspace for children’s clothes and toys. She later started selling eggs from her chickens and pecans from her tire-swing tree.

And this fall , she went a step further. A request for leftover pumpkins.

She got a response from a church in Forsyth. That’s Forsyth County, Ga.  The church had 100 rotting pumpkins, ready for a roll down the hill.

That was a little too far to drive, Kim thought. For rotting pumpkins.

So, she stuck close to her family’s 18-acre farm . So far, she’s gotten 20 pumpkins . All for free. All by using a 21st century tool to perpetuate a technique probably used by her husband’s grandfather, a man called “Paw Paw.’’

 That’s Alvin Taylor. In 1945, he bought 50 acres in Kernersville, just across the Guilford County line, and raised tobacco, corn and cows.

Now, 32 acres  remain in the Taylor family. They raise chickens, goats and horses like Ladybug  and grow everything from okra and cantaloupes to watermelons, peppers, beans and tomatoes.

And now, they’re getting leftover pumpkins. A Logan treat.

“Mom!’’ Logan shouts. “I’m gonna roll it! I’m gonna roll it. Will you let me break it, too?’’

She does. Within minutes after rolling it into the chicken house, Logan has a shovel in his hand. Time to smash. Time to be a boy. Time to ask one more question.

“Where are the seeds?’’ Logan asks. “I can’t see them!’’

“Don’t worry,’’ Kim tells her oldest. “They’re in the pumpkin, buddy.’’

Contact Jeri Rowe at 373-7374 or jeri.rowe@news-record.com