Perl Template Toolkit <% IF %> conditional seems to not be working

Question

I have the section of html below that I would like to display when the hash 'Season' has value. The trouble is that the section shows up even when Season has no value, I don't even send a variable named Season to the template, or even if I change the line below to <% IF XSeason.size %>

<% IF Season.size %> <!-- season data -------------------------------------->
<div class="container" style="margin-top:20px;">
  <div class="row">
    <h3 class="text-center"> This should only show up if Season hash has value</h3>
    <div class="col-md-12">
      <div class="col-md-10">
    <div class="form-group">
      <table style="width:100%; line-height:40px;">   <!-- Feats (so far) as a table // -->
        <% FOREACH $name in Seasonkeys %>
        <tr>
          <form role="form" action="../alpview" method="POST">
        <td width="5"><% Season$name.stat %></td> 
        <td width="5"><% Season$name.AVG %></td> 
        <input type="hidden" name="chlng_id" value="<% Season$ID.ID %>" />
          </form>
        </tr>   
        <% END %>   
      </table>
    </div>
      </div>
    </div>
  </div>
</div>
<% END %>

UPDATE: Here is a simpler example.

<h2>Lets start with an array reference<h2>
<h3>What about fruits array: </h3>
<% FOREACH fruit IN fruits %>
<% fruit %>
<% END %>
<p>array size: </p><% fruits.size %></p>
<p>array dumped: </p><% USE Dumper; Dumper.dump(fruits) %>

OUTPUT:

Lets start with an array reference
What about fruits array:
apple bananna orange
array size:

array dumped:

Answer 1

Your claim is easily disproven:

use 5.014;
use warnings;

use Template qw( );

my $template = '<% IF Season.size %>Test<% END %>';

my $tt = Template->new({
   START_TAG => '<%',
   END_TAG   => '%>',
});

print "No var:         ";
$tt->process(\$template, { })
   or warn($tt->error());
say "";

print "Empty hash:     ";
$tt->process(\$template, { Season => { } })
   or warn($tt->error());
say "";

print "Not empty hash: ";
$tt->process(\$template, { Season => { a => 4 } })
   or warn($tt->error());
say "";

Output:

No var:
Empty hash:
Not empty hash: Test

Your hash must not be empty.

Answer 2

Try adding this just after the <% IF ... %> tag.

<% Season.size %>
<% USE Dumper; Dumper.dump(Season) %>

At least you'll see what TT thinks is in the variable.