Pickens was cast in recurring roles in "The Legend of Custer", "Bonanza", "Hee Haw" (where he was a semiregular from 1981 until his death), "B. J. and the Bear" with Greg Evigan, and "Filthy Rich". He played Wild Jack Monroe, the owner of station WJM, in CBS's "The Mary Tyler Moore Show", and also guest-starred as Zeke in the 1963 episode "Higgins and the Hillbilly" of the ABC sitcom "Our Man Higgins", which starred Stanley Holloway as a British butler for a suburban American family. Pickens portrayed Grandpa Shoenfield in a two-part 1980 episode of ABC's "The Love Boat".