Corn Mazes, Pumpkin Patches and Farm Days Near Fredericton (Fall 2026)

The season, and what "farm day" means around here

Corn is tall enough to get lost in by mid-September, pumpkins are orange by the last week of the month, and the frost that would end it all usually holds off until October. That gives the capital region roughly six weekends of farm season, and the farms know it: mazes open on the same weekend the apples come in, and by the second week of October most of them are running wagon rides, hot food and some version of a Halloween evening.

The farms here are small, family-run and honest about what they are. Nobody has a sixty-acre corporate maze with a corporate ticketing app. What you get instead is a farmer's kid selling you a wagon-ride ticket and a maze that was cut with the family tractor, which is the better story anyway. It also means hours and prices live on Facebook and change with the weather; the single most useful habit this season is checking the page before you leave the driveway.

Laughing Apple Farm: the maze, the tower, the gourd tunnel

Laughing Apple Farm, 311 Route 615 in Scotch Settlement, is about half an hour from downtown on the road toward Mactaquac, and it is the closest thing the region has to a fall theme park. The centrepiece is a three-acre corn maze with a seventeen-foot lookout tower in the middle, which serves both as the reward for finding it and as the way parents locate children who have gone feral. Around it: tractor-pulled wagon rides, a giant sandbox, a gourd tunnel the farm bills as the world's longest, photo backdrops, food sales and public washrooms. The orchard side grows Honeycrisp and Ambrosia for u-pick, with pumpkins, gourds and cut flowers at the stand.

Tourism NB lists it open from mid-September until the end of October, with weekend hours of 10 to 6 in past seasons. It is a confirmed host for Atlantic Open Farm Day on Sunday, September 20, 2026 (10 to 5 that day). In past Octobers the farm has run a scare maze after dark; the 2026 dates and prices had not been posted when we checked, so watch the page. Admission and maze prices were likewise not published online; expect to pay per person for the maze and per ride for the wagon, and bring cash. Phone 506-440-3943.

River View Orchard: the maze with the apples attached

River View Orchard, 251 Route 616 on Keswick Ridge, twenty-five minutes from downtown, is first an orchard (eight apple varieties, pears, plums) and second a fall outing: a corn maze, wagon rides, a sandbox, and pumpkins from the field. It is the right choice when half the car wants apples and the other half wants to get lost. Past hours have been daily 10 to 6, 10 to 5 on Sundays. The orchard has run a fall festival and craft show on a late-September weekend in recent years, with vendors and a coffee truck; the 2026 date was not posted when we checked. Maze size and pricing are not published, so ask when you arrive. Phone 506-238-7537.

Moxon's Country Pumpkin: pumpkins, pie and a playground

If the goal is pumpkins rather than a maze, Moxon's Country Pumpkin, 911 Route 105 in Maugerville, is the stop. Fifteen minutes from downtown along the north side of the river, it has been a farm stand since 1960 and is now a stand, bakery, ice cream window, playground and small barnyard of animals, and it is pet-friendly. It is open daily 9:30 to 6 through December 23, 2026, which makes it the one place on this list still selling squash when the mazes are long mowed. Whether pumpkins are pick-your-own or pre-picked varies with the field; the stand always has them from late September. Phone 506-357-8013.

Every orchard in our apple guide sells pumpkins too: Everett's in Island View pairs them with squash, cider and horses; Johnny Appleseed sells pumpkins, straw bales and gourds at the stand; Cameron's and Hall's in Gagetown and Fredericton Junction stock squash and pumpkins alongside the apples. And the Boyce Farmers Market on Saturdays has pumpkins by the truckload from October, along with the only pie pumpkins some of us trust.

Atlantic Open Farm Day, Sunday September 20

Atlantic Open Farm Day is the one Sunday a year when working farms across the Maritimes open their gates for free, and in 2026 it is Sunday, September 20. The Fredericton-area participants are Laughing Apple Farm in Scotch Settlement, Pinefork Stables in Nasonworth, Brigadoon Fiber Farm in Hoyt (the community, not the orchard), Grimross Farm in Gagetown, and Big Sky Ventures in Chipman, which grows sea buckthorn. Each farm posts its own hours and activities on the Open Farm Day site. It is the cheapest farm day of the year and the only one where you are encouraged to ask the farmer how the thing actually works.

Scares: the SPCA hike, the scare maze, and the TikTok mix-up

Three things get called "the haunted corn maze in Fredericton" online, and only one of them is here.

The Oromocto and Area SPCA Monster Mash Haunted Hike is the family-friendly one: a one-evening walk through the Oromocto Gateway Wetlands staffed by classic monsters, entry by donation to the shelter. The 2025 edition ran Saturday, October 25 from 6 to 7:30 p.m. The 2026 date had not been posted when we checked; the SPCA's calendar currently shows Paws for a Cause on Sunday, September 27 (1 to 5 at 111 D'Amours Street, free, barbecue by donation), so expect the hike announcement in October.

Laughing Apple Farm's scare maze is the region's after-dark maze in the years it runs; details for 2026 are pending on the farm's page.

And the "Haunted Corn Maze" that shows up on TikTok and Facebook events under the Fredericton name is at 2927 Fredericton Road in Salisbury, which is Green Pig Market's sunflower farm outside Moncton, about an hour and three-quarters away. Fredericton Road is a road, not a city. Worth the drive if you make a night of it, but not a reason to put the kids in costumes and head to Marysville.

Sunflowers, and the fields we could not find

People ask every September, so here is the honest answer: there is no sunflower field within a short drive of Fredericton that we could verify for 2026. The province's sunflower attraction is Green Pig Market's NB Sunflower Experience in Salisbury (six acres, thirty varieties, wagon rides), and it blooms in mid-to-late August, so by the time the corn mazes open it is over. If a Fredericton-area farm plants one, it will appear on Facebook first and on this page second. Tell Freddy if you spot it.

How to do a farm day well

Go in the morning on a Saturday or any time on a Sunday; the noon-to-three window on a sunny Saturday in October is when the wagon line and the parking field both fill. Wear boots. A corn maze after two days of rain is mud to the ankle, and the ground under an orchard is a carpet of windfalls. Dress a layer warmer than town: these farms sit on ridges and river flats where the wind has nothing to hit. Bring cash for the maze and the wagon even where cards are accepted, and bring a bag for the pumpkins, because they do not fit in a stroller basket, as everyone discovers once.

Stack the day: Laughing Apple or River View for the maze and apples, Moxon's or the market for pumpkins on the way back, and the Arcadia scenic drive down Route 102 if you went south. Peak foliage in the lower river valley lands in the first two weeks of October, which is also when the mazes are at their best, so a single Sunday can cover the leaves, the maze and the pumpkin. That is the whole fall in one tank of gas.