This is the time of the year for blossoms, berries and the return of the bears, and if you have fruit trees on your property they may be considered an open lunch bar to the Sea to Sky Corridor's ursine population.
Fruit is the second biggest attractant for bears after garbage. But thankfully there is a solution in sight. The District of Squamish's (DOS) Bear Aware program has teamed up with Squamish Climate Action Network's (CAN) food group to bring the Squamish Fruit Tree Project back to life after a winter's hibernation, for the second year running.
"The fruit tree program is a great example of collaboration at its best," said Ana Santos, Squamish CAN co-ordinator. "While working on it, we help Bear Aware eliminate wildlife attractants, we help residents with the chore of picking fruit they don't want and we help feed those who are in need.
"And at the same time bringing all sorts of people together to collectively work on a project that will give them satisfaction, physical activity, fresh air and a wonderful community feeling. Can it get any better than that?"
Every year thousands of pounds of apples, pears, plums and cherries fall to the ground to rot in the backyards of Squamish. The Squamish Fruit Tree Project helps to eliminate this food waste by connecting people with fruit to community groups who need fruit.
Squamish residents who have fruit trees and are unable to harvest their fruit contact Bear Aware, and Squamish CAN and a team of hard-working volunteers come to pick the fruit and distribute it within the community. Last year fruit was donated to six different community groups.
Krystle tenBrink, co-ordinator of the Squamish Fruit Tree Project, said the project was a perfect example of how food that was headed for the bin could be saved and used in the community.
"The idea behind Squamish CAN operating the Fruit Tree Project was that the food group could get active in a project that was fairly inexpensive and would be able to educate the community on a variety of issues, such as utilizing local existing fruit, supplying fresh fruit to local community groups and helping homeowners take responsibility for their fruit trees attracting bears," she said.
The 2010 Fruit Tree Project season was an amazing first year for CAN to be involved, said tenBrink. "The project was so successful thanks to the nine homeowners that allowed us to pick their fruit, the 22 volunteers that came out to pick on more than one picking session, and the six different community groups that accepted the fruit," she said.
"Considering the cold, wet spring we had [2010], we were still able to pick 60 milk crates of edible fruit from cherries, yellow and purple plums, apples and crabapples."
Meg Toom, DOS Bear Aware community co-ordinator, said she is pleased with the partnership with Squamish CAN. "It's a great collaborative partnership and we're hoping to continue the good work this year," she said.
"It's difficult statistically to measure whether the program has an impact on reducing conflict with bears, but any efforts that are made to keep non-natural food away from bears will assist with the overall conflict mitigation process."
The 2011 Squamish Fruit Tree Project is set to be bigger than ever, tenBrink said, thanks to ongoing funding.
"We hope to get more homeowners that have fruit trees participating in the project. With CAN's food group receiving funding for the second year, we were able to purchase some professional fruit tree picking equipment to reach those stubborn apples way at the top to the tree."
Squamish CAN's food group, meanwhile, is hosting a field trip to Vancouver and Richmond today (Friday, June 10) that organizers hope will boost the local community garden project (see "Squamish CAN farm literally," Chief, June 3) as well as the Fruit Tree Project.
Stops include the Sole Food Farm in East Vancouver, which provides training and employment opportunities to residents of Vancouver's Downtown Eastside to build, plant, maintain and harvest produce.The locally grown food is sold to restaurants and at farmers' markets.
The second stop will be at the Richmond Fruit Tree Sharing Project and tenBrink is eager to learn more about it.
"This rural farm has few staff and is mostly operated by volunteers that grow and harvest healthy produce to give to charitable food distribution organizations," she said. "They offer workshops on related issues around food security, organic practices, farm gardens and youth."
The Richmond Food Bank benefits from the project and praises the group's efforts.
"The labours of The Fruit Tree Project volunteers are helping to overcome a significant barrier to health and well-being among the poor in Richmond," the Fruit Tree Project website states. "We thank The Fruit Tree volunteers for their hard work to provide the food security that is essential to the health of individuals and community."
Participants will travel to Vancouver on the recently converted veggie-oil-powered bus, a joint project of the Squamish CAN transportation group, Switchover.ca and Camp Summit. Santos commented on the benefits of making the trip even more environmentally friendly.
"Going on the veggie-oil-powered bus is a real treat," she said. "I love it when we can combine projects together and become more efficient ourselves while offering the education that goes with it all, as we go along."
The Squamish Fruit Tree Project is set to start in July. If you have fruit trees available to be harvested or if you are interested in being a volunteer for the Squamish Fruit Tree Project, please contact [email protected] or Meg Toom from Bear Aware at [email protected].
