# Peter Piper, and pickling **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [October 19, 2005, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peter-piper-and-pickling/326965 "2005-10-19T19:28:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![tracer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tracer/32/20578_2.png) [@tracer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tracer)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2005, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peter-piper-and-pickling/326965/1 "2005-10-19T19:28:22Z")
When **P** eter **P** iper **p** icked a **p** eck of **p** ickled **p** peppers, how in **p** urgatory was it **p** ossible for the **p** eppers to be already **p** ickled? I mean, if you wanted to **p** ick a **p** epper, you’d **p** ut your **p** aws around a **p** epper and **p** ull. **P** resto! You’ve **p** icked a **p** epper. But it’s not a **p** ickled **p** epper, is it? To **p** ickle the **p** epper, you have to **p** lace the **p** epper in a **p** ickling jar, with brine or vinegar or some other **p** ickling **p** otion. So, then, how does one **p** ick a **p** eck of **p** ickled **p** eppers? Is this merely a euphemism for **p** icking a vertiety of **p** eppers that are typically **p** ickled before they’re brought to market? Or can the **p** eppers themselves be **p** re- **p** ickled right on the **p** epper **p** lant? And on an unrelated note, was it a U.S. dry peck or a British Imperial peck? The latter’s bigger than the former, y’know. ---
**Author:** ![AskNott](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asknott/32/5790_2.png) [@AskNott](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AskNott)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2005, 9:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peter-piper-and-pickling/326965/2 "2005-10-19T21:41:01Z")
What, you want logic from children’s tongue twisters? For me, or Mr. Piper to pick pickled peppers, we’d have to be in a store, where there might be several brands of them. Do I want Vlasic, Aunt Jane’s, or Dave’s Insanity? Which ones do I pick? ---
**Author:** ![tracer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tracer/32/20578_2.png) [@tracer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tracer)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2005, 10:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peter-piper-and-pickling/326965/3 "2005-10-19T22:26:38Z")
Ah – you feel that “picked”, as it appears in the original, is intended to mean “selected” rather than “harvested.” But if that is the case, I hasten to remind you that no commercially available brand of pickled peppers – not Vlasic, not Aunt Jane’s, not Dave’s Insanity (private reserve or otherwise) – is sold by the peck. They’re sold by weight, generally 16 oz. or 24 oz., not by volume. Liquefied pepper sauces such as Dave’s Insanity Sauce **are** sold by volume, but they’re sold in U.S. **liquid** volumes such as the fluid ounce or the U.S. liquid quart, not in U.S. dry volumes such as the peck or bushel. The only things that are still sold by U.S. dry volume are cherry tomatoes, strawberries, and those grains they trade in commodities futures contracts. Plus, it’s clear that the author was describing Peter Piper’s accomplishment for the day, not merely a single act of product-selection. Othersie it would not have been worthy of mention. ---
**Author:** ![Zsofia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/7bcc69/32.png) [@Zsofia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zsofia)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2005, 11:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peter-piper-and-pickling/326965/4 "2005-10-19T23:25:57Z")
Possibly Peter picked a peck of **pickling** peppers and proceeded to pickle the peck? ---
**Author:** ![Rufus\_Xavier](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/eada6e/32.png) [@Rufus\_Xavier](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rufus_Xavier)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2005, 11:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peter-piper-and-pickling/326965/5 "2005-10-19T23:44:45Z")
Does anyone here knoe how many pickled peppers are in a peck? ---
**Author:** ![AskNott](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asknott/32/5790_2.png) [@AskNott](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AskNott)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2005, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peter-piper-and-pickling/326965/6 "2005-10-19T23:48:02Z")
> [@tracer](#): > > But if that is the case, I hasten to remind you that no commercially available brand of pickled peppers – not Vlasic, not Aunt Jane’s, not Dave’s Insanity (private reserve or otherwise) – is sold by the peck. No, they aren’t, nowadays. Surely, though, this bit of children’s wordplay predates modern packaging. A peck of pickled peppers would have been fished out of a barrel or big crock for sale. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![AskNott](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asknott/32/5790_2.png) [@AskNott](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AskNott)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2005, 11:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peter-piper-and-pickling/326965/7 "2005-10-19T23:49:08Z")
Aw, never mind. This is just too silly. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2005, 11:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peter-piper-and-pickling/326965/8 "2005-10-19T23:49:22Z")
What _kind_ of seashells does she sell by the seashore? And don’t even get me started on those wood-chucking woodchucks! ---
**Author:** ![lightingtool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/57b2e6/32.png) [@lightingtool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lightingtool)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2005, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peter-piper-and-pickling/326965/9 "2005-10-20T00:34:59Z")
> [@tracer](#): > > But if that is the case, I hasten to remind you that no commercially available brand of pickled peppers – not Vlasic, not Aunt Jane’s, not Dave’s Insanity (private reserve or otherwise) – is sold by the peck. They’re sold by weight, generally 16 oz. or 24 oz., not by volume. Good point, but perhaps he ended up with the (yet unspecified) peck by purchasing a few jars of pickled peppers. For example, I measure paprika with a teaspoon, but the container is usually labeled with an amount in ounces (some settling of product may occur), from which I can plan on getting a certain number of teaspoons. As one US Peck equals 1787.36 teaspoons, buying paprika by the peck could be particularly painful. ---
**Author:** ![iamthewalrus\_3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/258eb7/32.png) [@iamthewalrus\_3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iamthewalrus_3)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2005, 1:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peter-piper-and-pickling/326965/10 "2005-10-20T01:00:31Z")
Perhaps, could Peter Piper have been performing his part as the prime producer in a pickling plant? Perchance a peerless peck he preferred to price higher. ---
**Author:** ![Alan\_Smithee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/2acd7d/32.png) [@Alan\_Smithee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alan_Smithee)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2005, 4:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peter-piper-and-pickling/326965/11 "2005-10-20T04:03:11Z")
As I recall, Peter Piper got his start in a book of alphabetical tongue twisters. Each tongue twister had the form of asserting an action by a character, questioning the veracity of that assertion, and then asking conditional upon the veracity of the assertion where the evidence for it lies. The fullness of the entry for P was _Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers. Did Peter Piper pick a peck of pickled peppers? If Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers, where’s the peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked?_ From this, we can determine that Peter Piper **may not** , in fact, have picked a peck of pickled peppers! We can also see that alliteration and suitability to the format were probably higher priorities than sensability. The author had twenty-six of tese things to get through, and doesn’t seem to have exercised the greatest care. Finally, my take on it has always been that the impossability of the act was precisely the cause of its noteworthiness, and that it was intended to play on the childish notion of processed foods arising naturally, much like the childhood fantasy that chocolate milk comes from brown cows. ---
**Author:** ![Alan\_Smithee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/2acd7d/32.png) [@Alan\_Smithee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alan_Smithee)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2005, 4:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peter-piper-and-pickling/326965/12 "2005-10-20T04:07:25Z")
[This](http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0486225607/102-7247176-4168911?v=glance&n=283155&s=books&v=glance) is probably the book I remember. I can’t prove it’s the origin of PP, but it seems very likely. ---
**Author:** ![Rufus\_Xavier](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/eada6e/32.png) [@Rufus\_Xavier](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rufus_Xavier)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2005, 4:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peter-piper-and-pickling/326965/13 "2005-10-20T04:23:09Z")
Several web sites have the version **Alan Smithee** remembers. There’s also this version: [http://www.enchantedlearning.com/rhymes/Peterpiper.shtml](http://www.enchantedlearning.com/rhymes/Peterpiper.shtml) Which ends with the question “If Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers, how many pickled peppers did Peter Piper pick?” Surely there must be someone out there in Doperland who can give us an educated guess of how many pickled peppers you could reasonably expect to find in a peck and thus answer the question for good and all? Anyone? Bueller? ---
**Author:** ![The\_Chao\_Goes\_Mu](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_chao_goes_mu/32/3191_2.png) [@The\_Chao\_Goes\_Mu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Chao_Goes_Mu)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2005, 12:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peter-piper-and-pickling/326965/14 "2005-10-20T12:51:17Z")
For me this thread merely lends proof that you are all just players in my solipsistic universe. 😃 Last night my GF and a friend were just discussing Peter Piper and his damned pickled peppers. For the record neither my GF nor our friend peruse these boards. The Peter Piper tongue twister caused me great consternation in school due to the fact that it is the one tongue twister I cannot, even to this day, master. I have found my tongue tripping up on the word “peppers” in the form of, (much to the shock of my teachers) the word “peckers.” As far as weather he really picked a peck of pickled peppers. I think Mr Piper should cite. Mmm hmmm. That’s right. ---
**Author:** ![lightingtool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/57b2e6/32.png) [@lightingtool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lightingtool)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2005, 4:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peter-piper-and-pickling/326965/15 "2005-10-20T16:01:25Z")
> [@Rufus Xavier](#): > > Surely there must be someone out there in Doperland who can give us an educated guess of how many pickled peppers you could reasonably expect to find in a peck and thus answer the question for good and all? > > Anyone? Bueller? Ok. 1 US peck = 297.893694 fluid ounces, or about 2.32729448 gallons. One pound of peppers will give you approximately one pint of pickled peppers (see [here](http://hgic.clemson.edu/factsheets/HGIC3440.htm)), and as there are 8 pints in a gallon, Peter would have to pick around 18.5 pounds of non-pickled peppers to create his own particular pickled peppers. The average weight of a Marconi Red grown in Pennsylvania’s Lancaster County is .26 pounds (see [here](http://lancaster.extension.psu.edu/Horticulture/VarietyTrials/2004PepperVarietyTrialEvaluation.htm#TableTwo)), which means Peter picked right around 71 pickled peppers. As the number of peppers does not change during the pickling process, as long as we all can agree that Peter lived in Lancaster County and did his picking in 2004 under carefully controlled conditions, he ended up with 71 (give or take a few) pickled peppers. ---
**Author:** ![furryman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/furryman/32/99_2.png) [@furryman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/furryman)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2005, 6:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peter-piper-and-pickling/326965/16 "2005-10-20T18:26:41Z")
Ah, but _where’s_ the peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked? [Columbo] Excuse me ma’am, but we’re investigating the disappearance of a peck of pickled peppers.[Columbo] ---
**Author:** ![Cervaise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cervaise/32/16693_2.png) [@Cervaise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cervaise)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2005, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peter-piper-and-pickling/326965/17 "2005-10-20T19:25:14Z")
> [@Thudlow Boink](#): > > And don’t even get me started on those wood-chucking woodchucks! Further, it is the height of parental irresponsibility to outfit a child’s buggy such that it can be bumped against other buggies, or any objects, really. Even if it is a rubber baby. ---
**Author:** ![Alan\_Smithee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/2acd7d/32.png) [@Alan\_Smithee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alan_Smithee)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2005, 7:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peter-piper-and-pickling/326965/18 "2005-10-20T19:31:48Z")
It’s the baby-buggy bumpers that are rubber, not the baby! (I used to have the same misconception.) And clearly they are there for the child’s protection. After all, you never know when you might be walking Baby in the park, past that rugged rock, when some ragged rascal comes running round it out of nowhere! Without apropriate precautions, it’s a disaster waiting to happen, I tell you. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Chao\_Goes\_Mu](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_chao_goes_mu/32/3191_2.png) [@The\_Chao\_Goes\_Mu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Chao_Goes_Mu)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2005, 7:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peter-piper-and-pickling/326965/19 "2005-10-20T19:40:48Z")
Hmm. The gal selling sea shells by the seashore is, in my opinion, one of the worst entrepeneurs…_ever._ She’s got about as much vision as the guy selling sand in the desert. _Unless_, she is actually selling them. People are buying these shells by the seashore. In that case, the girl would reign supreme on The Apprentice. The Donald would be proud. ---
**Author:** ![Cervaise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cervaise/32/16693_2.png) [@Cervaise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cervaise)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2005, 1:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peter-piper-and-pickling/326965/20 "2005-10-21T01:05:18Z")
> [@Alan Smithee](#): > > After all, you never know when you might be walking Baby in the park, past that rugged rock, when some ragged rascal comes running round it out of nowhere! I wouldn’t worry about him. As long as there’s a post nearby, he’ll just engage in a little harmless fist-thrusting. His babble about undead spirits is equally innocuous. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peter-piper-and-pickling/326965.md?page=2)