I've often wondered about the process of pickling on the vine, so to speak. There was a joke that almost got the comic strip Bloom County kicked of of many a comic page that involved a nun and a pickle and it seems that it may have resonated with an old line about doing pushups in a field.

A peck is a dry measure equal to 8 quarts (537.605 cubic inches) or 8.810 liters. This is one quarter of a bushel. That would be a lot of normal supermarket size jars, but perhaps if he got them at the SuprValuBulkMart he got them in an 8 quart jug.