According to PBS, honeybees pollinate about one-third of crops in the United States, including apples, nuts, broccoli, avocados, soybeans, asparagus, celery, squash, cucumbers, citrus fruit, peaches, kiwi, cherries, blueberries, cranberries, strawberries, cantaloupe, melons, and animal-feed crops such as clover.

While the declining honeybee population isn’t likely to stamp out flowering crops from our diets just yet, improving honeybee health is imperative. Honeybees aren’t the only pollinators – other insects and birds also pollinate fruits and vegetables – but replacing honeybees would not be ideal. “The problem with other natural pollinators picking up the bees’ slack is that today’s agricultural industry has simply grown too large for them to keep up,” according to the PBS article.

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The USDA reports beekeepers losing 30 percent of their honeybees each year, but this winter, “hive losses in the 70-90 percent range [were] reported.” Pesticide Action Network spokesperson Paul Towers told TakePart, “Bees pollinate over 95 different types of fruits and vegetables, with almonds being the most prolific… What happens in the almond crop spells good news or bad news for other crops. There’s a ripple effect as commercial bees get moved from almonds to blueberries to cranberries and pumpkins.”

Colony collapse disorder, the abrupt disappearance of worker bees, rose drastically in late 2006.  The disorder was most drastic in North America, but similar phenomena were observed in Europe as well. The incidence of CCD has grown with the increased use of insecticides, particularly neonicotinoids that include clothianidin and thiamethoxam, manufactured primarily by Syngenta and Bayer Crop Science. Other possible causes of CCD may be weather, parasites, and disease.

Why are the neonicotinoids so dangerous? “Neonicotinoids are applied before planting to coat seeds,” Towers explained in an article on TakePart in March 2013. The pesticide, which was created as a ‘better’ alternative to DDT, “is then taken up through the vascular system of the plant and expressed through the pollen and nectar, which bees rely on for food.”

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So what can be done to help the honeybees? In the short term, bringing in bumblebees – albeit more expensive than the honeybee – to take over some of the work has been successful in the Netherlands. Improving honeybee nutrition and reducing stress will be helpful in the long term, though it may require skipping some less nutritious crops some years, according to PBS.  Breeding domesticated honeybees with wild or feral honeybees may have a positive effect, as well. Perhaps a more obvious solution, as insinuated by the articles on Grist and TakePart, would be to limit or halt the use of insecticides, specifically neonicotinoids, completely, as has been done in Germany, France, and Slovenia. These European countries are awaiting more conclusive research on the safety of such chemicals, and the UK is considering following suit.

The United States’ Environmental Protection Agency is currently facing a lawsuit from the Pesticide Action Network for ignoring warnings about problems posed by neonicitinoids. According to an article on Grist, “An internal EPA memo released [in 2010] confirms that the very agency charged with protecting the environment is ignoring the warnings of its own scientists about clothianidin, a pesticide from which Bayer racked up about $262 million in sales in 2009.”

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How can you help? In the words of Michael Pollan, vote with your fork! Consider choosing organic produce from the grocery store, and support farmers who do not use pesticides (who may or may not have the organic certification) when you shop at your local farmers’ market. If you have the space, consider planting a backyard fruit tree for fresh, local, chemical-free fruit that will not only enhance your family’s health, but the health of honeybee colonies as well.

The goods I took home from a farmers’ market in February

Just a couple weeks ago, while perusing the organics section of my local produce market, I realized just how often I’d been purchasing my fruits and vegetables at the farmers’ markets and through Farm Fresh To You, a CSA. The apple I’d just picked up was covered in a waxy film, presumably to prolong ‘freshness’ and ‘improve’ appearance. I found myself disgusted, longing for the less-shiny, unmistakably fresh Pink Ladies and Fujis available at the Sunday market.

My first farm box from Farm Fresh To You

But it wasn’t just the apples. All the produce, at both the produce market and the big-name grocery store, looked abysmal compared to what’s offered at my farmers’ market. The oranges, tomatoes, lemons, and celery all seemed to wilt ever so slightly under the artificial light, barely resembling their bright, perky, colorful counterparts that hang out under tents and draw you in with their smell just a block away every weekend.

Was I becoming a snobby shopper who only shops at upscale weekly markets?

Just as I was starting to wonder if I was becoming an annoying foodie, Grist published an article about how farmers’ markets stand to benefit the poor the most. I decided to do a little digging.

Fresh-squeezed orange juice from a 10-pound bag of well-priced oranges from the market

As it turns out, says Susie Cagle, the article’s author, “Low-income shoppers are actually the real farmers-market power users, buying bigger shares of their groceries at the markets than at other stores compared to middle- and high-income shoppers.” In fact, most of those low-income shoppers believed they found better prices at the market than at the grocery store, and I agree with them. After bringing home my farmers’ market bounty this weekend, I compared prices for the same items in the same amounts from Safeway. The verdict? Shopping at the market got me fresher produce and supported local farmers while saving me $2.

So what’s stopping more low-income families from purchasing fresh fruits and vegetables from the farmers’ market? Cagle argues it’s a lack of basic information.

While the farmers’ market in my town isn’t as likely to attract a lot of low-income shoppers, the Jack London Square Farmers’ Market in Oakland, CA is. Sarah Trent, Promotions Coordinator for the Pacific Coast Farmers’ Market Association, says that all the Pacific Coast markets accept CalFresh (food stamp) cards, as well as WIC (supplemental nutrition program for women, infants, and children) benefits – and not only do they accept food stamps, they offer customers an additional $5 when they purchase at least $10 with their CalFresh cards at participating markets. Michigan has a comparable program that offers even more rewards for shopping at farmers’ markets called Double Up Food Bucks – the amount of food stamp money (up to $20) spent by a consumer at the market is matched by the Double Up Food Bucks program, and can be used towards Michigan-grown produce. Similar programs exist at some markets in Connecticut, California, New York, and Massachusetts. Those are some pretty sweet deals.

Hand-picked strawberries grown in a friend’s backyard

The produce (and baked goods, specialty food items, flowers, cheeses, meats, eggs, coffees, and other artisan creations) at farmers’ markets is impressive, and shopping primarily at a local market puts one more in touch with the seasonality of food. Had it not been for my frequenting the market, I wouldn’t have known that while fruits are limited in the winter, persimmons grace us with their presence during the month of December, their sweet nectar as addictive as sugar. I wouldn’t have discovered kale’s ability to pump up a stir-fry (thanks to Happy Boy Farms for creating the “Stir Fry Greens Mix”) or learned that strawberries make their debut in late February. I wouldn’t have discovered the incredible fractal patterns on Romanesco broccoli, nor would I have become enamored with the strong, sweet fragrance of the narcissus bunches I can no longer pass up.

Romanesco broccoli

But while the produce from the farmers’ market allows a wide array of fresh food from within a relatively small radius (I haven’t found any red peppers from Mexico or asparagus from Peru) for a decent price - the Project for Public Spaces found that of those low-income shoppers who did not shop at the farmers’ market, only 17 percent cited price as an obstacle – there remains an even more inexpensive way to eat locally and provide fresh produce to those in need.

Making a purchase through The Urban Farmers, one fruit tree will cost about $25. This tree will produce hundreds of pounds of fruit every year, allowing the tree owner to collect more than enough to satisfy his or her family, with still hundreds of pounds to spare. Try spending $25 on canned fruits and vegetables – that might last a family of four two days, and many nutrients will have been lost in the process.

During a single harvest, The Urban Farmers can collect more than 700 pounds of fruit in about four hours. The average person eats about five pounds of food per day, which means that one day’s harvest can feed 140 people for one day, or 70 people for two days. Calculating in the cost of transportation, fruit harvested by The Urban Farmers runs between twelve and sixty cents per pound – try finding prices that low on fresh, organic fruit anywhere else.

My own home garden on my apartment patio – not only does it give me fresh lettuce and herbs, but offers a serene place to eat breakfast on a cool morning

The tremendously low-cost food harvested by The Urban Farmers gets donated to local hunger relief agencies, providing low-income residents and at-risk families high quality nutrition that would otherwise be unavailable.

Have a fruit tree or know someone who does? Register with The Urban Farmers to donate excess fruit. Don’t have a fruit tree but still want to help? Register as a volunteer and attend an upcoming harvest. And while the planting season is over right now, it’s never too early to start planning for your future tree – you can purchase one through The Urban Farmers to plant between December and mid-February.

There are a series of black-and-white photographs taken by Dorothea Lange depicting the struggles Dust Bowl migrants faced during the Great Depression. We’re all familiar with Migrant Mother, a portrait of pea-picker Florence Owens Thompson gazing out with a furrowed brow past the photographer while two of her children cling to her, facing away from the camera.

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But it’s Lange’s Dust Bowl Farm, a photograph of a simple, lone house in Texas surrounded by nothing but a desolate plain spotted with tumbleweeds, that became the featured image of an article on MyGreenology to highlight the world’s current “transition from an era of food abundance to one of scarcity.”

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The article cites population growth, the rise of affluence, the use of food as fuel for transportation vehicles, soil erosion, water shortages, and rising temperatures as catalysts for this transition. It likens this transition to patterns that led to the fall of ancient civilizations. “The Sumerians and Mayans are just two of the many civilizations that declined apparently because they moved onto an agricultural path that was environmentally unsustainable,” the author writes.  “While the decline of early civilizations can be traced to one or possibly two environmental trends such as deforestation and soil erosion that undermined their food supply, we are now dealing with several.”

Food prices are now double what they were in 2002-2004, according to the United Nations. For those already facing food insecurity, this is a serious problem.  Especially as local hunger relief agencies see cuts to essential support programs like TEFAP, backyard fruit trees are extremely valuable. Not only are these trees typically treated organically, they provide fresh food for the homeowner and – through donation – those who need it most at virtually no cost.

If you are fortunate to own a home and have a patch of land, plant a fruit tree. It will produce local, healthy food for decades to come. Already have your own or know someone who has a fruit tree that produces excess fruit year in and year out? Get registered with The Urban Farmers and help minimize hunger one tree at a time.

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Community Service

The school helps the students achieve a delicate balance of self-improvement and self-sacrifice for the benefit of others. For example The Athenian students on a regular basis volunteer at The Food Bank, Monument Crisis Center and help us harvest backyard fruit.

Environmental Stewardship

The list of environmental project at The Athenian is long and impressive. The students are involved with the maintenance of the park next door, to cleaning the shorelines.

On campus the students have implemented an impressive array of projects from building a bioswale to divert the water runoff, to building a permaculture garden and installing a composter large enough to handle the green waste of the community. For a list of other significant projects see this post.

Hunger Relief Approaches

Hunger in America is a persistent problem that seems to get worst year after year. In fact the level of food insecurity (a governmental euphemism for hunger) is at highest levels since records have been kept by USDA.

The antipoverty approach to food insecurity assumes that United States has plenty of food and food insecurity is the due to lack of income. The social-justice approach to hunger, advocates that the as a society we will always have those who can not take care of themselves and that able citizens have the obligation to take care of those who need help.

It is hard to argue with either approach. At The Urban Farmers, we believe the ideal solutions will also include environmental sustainability and high quality food.

Sustainability and Local Food

One way to address the issues of sustainability and food quality is to grow more food locally. This is why we advocate everyone should grow more food at home. For example in the past three years we have helped families in Contra Costa county plant 720 fruit trees.

Fruit trees provide a highly leveraged solution, where a small investment can feed the hungry some of the highest quality food available anywhere. This simple post quantifies the impact of a fruit tree on food availability..

Environmental Stewardship and Community Service

Planting of an orchard at The Athenian is at the intersection of these values. While the environmental value of planting trees is well documented, going the extra mile of growing food for donation, in such a scale, is an inspiring new development.

The students (with some help from us) will have a fully integrated solution where they learn how to grow a tree, produce food, harvest the food and deliver it to a hunger relief agency, not once, but for the next 50 years.

If you are a new visitor to our partner site, The Athenian School, consider this post to be your interpretive sign.

Two of the core values of the school, are environmental stewardship and community service. These values have been molded and practiced since 1965 when the school was founded by Dyke Brown

Arriving at School

Chances are you will be approaching the school from Diablo Road. At the three way stop sign you will turn onto Mt. Diablo Scenic Boulevard, where you’ll see the school sign on the right hand side.

Olive Trees

As you turn into the school grounds, notice the olive trees on your right hand side that line the driveway. Recently the same teacher that organized the orchard. organized a team of students in order to care of the trees. The trees have been pruned, monitored and harvested. This year, they collected almost a thousand pounds (960 lb.) of olives that were pressed into oil.

Estakhri Family Sports Field

The all weather sports field beyond the olive trees is an example of what we should consider for all school sports fields in the country. The installation of this field, saves nearly 2 million gallons of water annually.

Garden Project

As you go up the hill, at the end of the Estakhri Family Sports Field, on your left hand side you will see a residential building. The raised vegetable bed visible from the road, is a small part of The Athenian sustainable food production. Last year students grew 1,200 pounds of produce for their kitchen and converted 10,000 pounds of kitchen waste into 8,000 pounds of organic compost.

Solar Energy

In you are standing on the hill near the orchard, downhill, you will see the school’s swimming pool heated by the panels installed on the roof of the adjacent gym. From the same spot, if you look up the hill you will see a solar array system (one of the largest nonprofit installations in California) that produces nearly 70% of schools electricity needs.

The Orchard

The Athenian has a long tradition of taking care of the needy. Students volunteer at local hunger relief agencies such as the Contra Costa Food Bank, Monument Crisis Center and St Anthoney’s soup kitchen in San Francisco.

The newly planted orchard, located directly below the baseball field, hold 125 fruit trees where students will learn about the impact of fruit trees on the environment and produce fresh fruit for donation to charities.

Some of the goals we have for this new website are:

 Easy to modify – Many people from anywhere with a connection can update the site. (more about this at a later post)

Responsive Design – Given that more than half of devices connected to the internet are not desktop screen, we needed a design that can adopt to the size of the screen that it’s serving. The screen layout of this website changes based on the size of your device. Try it with an iphone or ipad or if you are at a desktop screen, simply drag the lower right hand corner of your browser window to the left and see what happens to text and graphics on the page.

Expandable – A week does not pass that someone come up with a good idea that should be included on the site. Now we can expand this site with less hassle.

However the best reason for this change is not technical. Amazing things are happening with the project every week and we want to share it with you. At the same time we don’t want to flood your mailbox with a bunch of e-mails.

Not only this site can help us communicate what’s going on, but in the near future you will be able to register your e-mail and control what you receive and when you receive it.

For now it’s a small-footed site that can be changed. Do us a favor and give it a ride. We like compliments as much as the next guy, but we also appreciate your comments about what you don’t like and that which is not working. Let us know what you think down below.

1. For Your Health - Some of the fruit that grow easily in N. California – such as Apples, Pears and Plums – are amongst the most heavily sprayed crops. For example USDA has found 42 pesticide residues on Apples where 5 are known (or probable) Carcinogens and 19 are Hormone Disruptors. By growing your own fruit, you can eat healthy, home grown food, without breaking the bank.

2. For Your Children - Our children are so divorced from their food, that they no longer know the season for fruits. Grapes are always available in the grocery store. You can teach your children about the cycle of food in nature using a single fruit tree in your backyard.

3. For the Needy - Over a billion people around the world are hungry, while the number of people unable to put adequate food on the table in the US, is at the highest levels since the USDA has tracked this data. A $30 fruit tree over it’s life time will produce thousands of pounds of fruit that can be shared with the needy.

4. For the Environment - Planting a tree is the easiest way to sequester carbon from the air and into the soil.

5. For Better Taste - There are thousands of Apple varieties, but if you look at what’s available in stores, you’d be forgiven for thinking that there are only 6 or 8 kinds of Apples. Some of the best tasting fruit is not suitable to the needs of commercial agriculture (shipping, shelf life, massive production, etc.) Instead of growing commonly available fruits, we are planting antique heirloom fruit trees. Some of these trees date back to 1200AD and the taste is so exceptional that in Europe, and at Chez Panisse they are still served as desert.

Apples

Plums

Pears

Peaches

Figs

Persimmons

Pomegranates

Quince

with some knowledge and care you can also grow

Cherries

Apricots.

If you are new to growing fruit trees, choose one the 12 fruit trees that are listed on the The Easy Dozen

Akane – Ripens Early

an attractive, early season, medium sized, bright red, apple with an unusually good balance of sweet and sharp flavors. The flesh is firm rather than crisp, but with plenty of juice. Disease resistant.

Liberty  – Ripens Midseason

Resistant to apple scab and mildew. A handsome red apple, usually school box size, of the McIntosh type with a wonderful sweet/tart balance. Crisper, keeps better and more heat tolerant than other McIntosh.

Cox Orange Pippin – Ripens Midseason

A famous, fabled apple of England that many feel is simply the best. It’s superb looking and extremely tasty apple. Cox Orange Pippin is often regarded as the finest of all dessert apples.

Spitzenburg (Esopus) – Ripens Midseason

Firm, crisp, fine grained, with a rich, aromatic, renowned flavor. This apple was one of the favorites of Thomas Jefferson. It is thought of as a dessert apple for connoisseurs.

Pears

Seckel (Sugar Pear) – Ripens Midseason – Good Storage

A must for the home orchard. Hardy and self-fertile.It’s reported that if any trees survive, Seckels do. Fruit small, reddish-brown russet over yellow or greenish-brown. Best flavor. Flesh creamy white and sweet. Tree is naturally semi-dwarf.

Warren – Ripens Very Late – Good Storage

Medium to large, long-necked, drop-shaped fruit is faded green with an occasional red blush in full sun. Sweet, very juicy, buttery, smooth flesh with no grit. Pyramidal tree shape.

Plums

Santa Rosa – Ripens Very Early

Superior quality flesh makes Santa Rosa the most widely grown plum. Purple-red skin surrounds rich, tart, fragrant, yellow flesh. Prolific, vigorous, self-fertile. One of the best of Luther Burbank’s creations.

Bavay’s Green Gage – Ripens Very Late

One of the best gages. This is still considered the ideal dessert plum in Europe. Meaty flesh with a rich gage flavor and incredible candy-like sweetness. Juicy, smooth-textured amber flesh.

Peaches

Babcock – Ripens Early

Old favorite in white-fleshed freestone peaches, sweet and juicy, aromatic, low acid. Does well in taste tests. Widely adapted because of low chill requirements (500 hours) but unlike other low chill fruits doesn’t bloom early.

Suncrest – Ripens Midseason

One of the last remaining truly juicy peaches. Large, round freestone peach with bright red blush over yellow skin. Yellow flesh, exceptionally firm texture, but very juicy, with good flavor. Heavy producer.

Rio Oso Gem – Ripens Late

Old favorite late, yellow freestone with large fruit and rich sweet flavor. A favorite of the Healdsburg folks for fresh eating, pies and freezing. A good garden tree as it has very showy pink blossoms and is a small tree.