trees

LA creates first "public orchard"

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Los Angeles has created a public park complete with public orchard. According to a LA Times article county officials, " hope the 'edible art' will encourage more locals to spend time there." Apparently it's the states first public orchard with residents planting "27 fruit trees and eight grapevines in Del Aire Park and 60 additional fruit trees in the surrounding neighborhood."

Three artists calling themselves, "Fallen Fruit" designed the orchard. David Burns, one of the artists said, " This is about creating something that is abundant that has no ownership." The Times say's, "for now, a wooden sign overlooking the trees describes their purpose: 'The fruit trees in this park belong to the public,' it says. 'They're for everyone, including you. Please take care of the fruit trees and when the fruit is ripe, taste it and share it with others.'" They planted "plums, pomegranates, limes, avocados and apricots." One of the residents across the street said, "he loves having fruit trees across from his home."

I am not sure how this is going to work. Will the county or residents maintain these trees? Who will be allowed to harvest the fruit? How much fruit can one community member take? The statement that, "this is about creating something that is abundant that has no ownership," concerns me. When no one "owns" the plot, who will feel the need to maintain it? If one neighbor ends up doing most of the maintenance how will they feel when others swoop in to take limes for their mojito's?" How much fruit is enough for one person to take?

Considering the number of fruit trees in the LA area that already bear fruit on property, and then is left to rot on the ground, I don't hold out much hope for this. Community gardens and farmers markets make it because people feel ownership, whether it's a small allotment or selling the fruit at market. This project has the county to fall back on, so their is no sense of ownership or pride in keeping it up. I hope it works, but I am afraid this has the makings of a "temporary art project".

Fallen Fruit has some interesting ideas however, one of which is "Public Fruit Maps".  According to their website, one of their "core projects is to map neighborhoods to which we are invited, mapping all the fruit trees that grow in or over public space.  The maps are hand-drawn and distributed free from copyright as jpgs and PDFs." This is a great idea, and one which may have more potential than the "public fruit park". They have also created a project titled, "Fruit Tree Adoptions". According to Fallen Fruit they "distribute free bare-root fruit trees in a variety of urban settings.  We encourage the planting of these trees in either public space or on the periphery of private property, in order to create new kinds of communal life based on generosity and sharing.  Each recipient signs an adoption form promising to care for the tree — initiating a relationship with it." I like the adoption form which provides that sense of "ownership", which may encourage the person signing up to adopt the trees to maintain them.

Fungus threatens both ash trees and British nurseries.

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According to The Guardian, "A fungus that has already affected 90% of ash trees in Denmark over the past seven years has now been detected in a handful of locations in the UK. If our government does not act urgently, warns the Woodland Trust, all Britain's estimated 80m ash trees could be lost to the fungal disease known as "ash dieback".  The Guardian say's, "Nurseries infected with the deadly fungus set to wipe out Britain's 80m ash trees have been removed from the official map of the outbreak the Guardian can reveal, after nursery owners complained that being identified might hurt their business."

While some nurseries are happy to be removed from the map others like "Judy Davey, who runs the Perrie Hale Forest Nursery near Honiton in Devon  said she had publicized the fact that an infected ash plant, bought from another UK nursery, had been discovered.  We decided to take the bull by the horns...we wanted people to know we were controlling this disease. Davey, whose nursery is in its third generation of family ownership, said the overall impact on the business "'has not been as bad as we feared'".

There is no cure for the disease.

"This is the most significant plant disease invasion into California in modern history"

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121_2102 California's citrus industry accounts for $2 billion in revenue. You would think a disease that threatens the industry would get more attention, yet this is the first I have heard about it. According to Yahoo news, "state bug detectives fanned across...suburban Los Angeles neighborhood Monday, vacuuming backyard trees with bug catchers, setting traps and taking tissue samples from citrus in a frantic effort to stop the spread of a deadly disease detected there last week."

According to the article, "the USDA confirmed on Friday what state agriculture officials had feared: Both a psyllid and the 8-foot, 8-year-old grafted lemon-pummelo tree where it was found March 22 in the Hacienda Heights suburb of Los Angeles County were infected with huanglongbing. The disease is 'citrus greening' which is transmitted by 'an infected psyllid.'  A psyllid is an insect that when feeding on a citrus leaf can transmit the disease from one tree to another. 'This is the most significant plant disease invasion into California in modern history,' said Ted Batkin of the Citrus Research Board."

Are you an organic gardener? State inspectors are fanning out across LA searching for the bug, and potentially infected tree's. If you have a infected tree the state will, "spray the tree with the pesticide TEMPO, a pyrethroid-type insecticide that lasts up to 30 days." Then they will remove the tree for destruction. "The state is asking the Office of Administrative Law for emergency authority ordering mandatory treatment all of the trees in the half-mile zone in an attempt to kill the psyllids and prevent the spread of the disease. County agriculture officials are working to educate homeowners by mailing out information prior to a community-wide meeting April 9".

I remember the early 80's living in The Bay Area, helicopters would fly over at night spraying Malathion in an attempt to eradicate The Mediterranean Fruit Fly. Ironically, the man who ordered the spraying then was Governor Jerry Brown, our current governor. Of course aerial spraying would be much more difficult to pull off in today's environment. So for now state inspectors are walking door to door hanging traps and inspecting trees. "In one 15-minute span on Monday CDFA trappers using vacuum-like devices collected 25 Asian citrus psyllids from a single backyard tree in the target area."

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I think this would be a great opportunity for garden centers, nurseries, and garden bloggers.  Use the power of social media to inform, and help people understand the nature of this threat. With so much happening in the world stuff like this can "end up under the fold" so to speak.  As the Yahoo article say's, "the people of Los Angeles County need to realize how important this is. It's so common to have citrus in residential backyards, and nobody wants to see widespread losses there."

Here is a post I did awhile back on the original Washington Navel Orange Tree, which still lives in the middle of a busy thoroughfare in Riverside. That tree has sure seen a lot of changes in the 130 plus years of it's existence.

Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot...

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My last post "Want Bio-Diversity in the garden? Plant natives" elicited a comment from a nursery woman in St Louis, Ellen Barredo. She say's, "The Horticulture Co-op along with the Missouri Botanical Garden hosted Doug Tallamy. Two weeks ago here in St Louis! Great speaker, great message. Anybody interested in this topic will not go wrong with this engaging speaker. The insect photos were awesome! The sad part was the attendance, 96 people of a possible 200 bought a ticket up to hear his message, attend other lectures, participate in the silent auction, or interact with vendor booths of local nurseries. Economy is improving somewhat here in St. Louis, so I was surprised! The breakdown occurs when you can’t get the media interested in promoting the topic and the speaker. More interested in sensational news." Sensational news like the new Lorax movie by Universal pictures. Many of my friends in the trade are excited about tying promotions to the movie. We're told that it presents an opportunity to take the enthusiasm for planting Truffula trees and turn it into enthusiasm for "Plant Something".   As Frank from New York City Garden say's in the comments, "Have you ever seen the ‘plant native’ back lashing given over at garden rant?! And you would think gardeners are the most likely to support such things, but man do some hate the idea. Meanwhile, I've seen invasive plants being planted more and more (like purple loosestrife). Oy."

So what's our message? "Plant Something?" It apparently does not matter what you plant.  In the case of The Lorax and IHOP you can plant Blue Spruce or Canadian White Pine, neither which grow well here in California. I know most of my friends in the nursery trade will disagree with me on this. "Trey, how can you not take advantage of this great opportunity to leverage the interest in planting trees from the movie?" I certainly would love to see an uptick in people interested in planting trees, but frankly the message Universal Pictures, Mazda, IHOP, and Hewlett Packard are sending via The Lorax doesn't "speak to me". More sensationalism that wanes away once people realize that "Truffla Approved" is for sale to the highest bidder, like Mazda. My daughter, and some trade friends told me I am over reacting. Commercialism is a part of our culture, and most younger people are use to it. Go with the flow, and jump on the bandwagon. Plant something! It's Truffula Tree approved! I can't, on account of the advice of the Lorax.  "Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better. It’s not.”

The Lorax and IHOP want you to plant trees

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Have you heard about the IHOP and The Lorax Sweepstakes? If you haven't you can, "visit any participating IHOP (resturant) starting February 20. Kids 3-12 get a free Lorax bookmark (while supplies last).  Plant the tree seed paper on the bookmark and help IHOP plant 3 million trees. Seed paper contains an evergreen mix of Blue Spruce and Canadian White Pine which may grow 20-40 feet wide. May be planted in a container to minimize size."

The Lorax is the children's book written by Dr. Seuss that, "chronicles the plight of the environment and the Lorax, who speaks for the trees against the greedy Once-ler." The Lorax Movie is being put out by Universal pictures who has partnered with IHOP to make as much out of it has they can. There is a sweepstakes and a couple of links to help you either,  "be more friendly to the environment" or "hug a tree, and have it hug you back."

Is this a worthwhile project? Some of my colleagues feel that it's a positive. Anything we can do to get people interested in trees and the outside world is good.  Hopefully they might come into the nursery asking for advice. Others feel giving away seed of trees that don't grow well in our climate (California) only sets people up for disappointment.  The idea that these trees can really be kept in a container to "minimize size" is not practical, either.  Is this the  classic question of the ends justifying the means? Perhaps  a child inspired by the movie and the potential trees that come from such tiny seeds is worth it? Or is this just a case of a couple of huge companies trying to capitalize on the Eco-movement, and nothing more? A little of both?