Guerilla Grafters strike in SF - grafting fruit producing branches on to trees. City don't like it.

[Liberal_in_LA]

Guerilla Grafters Strike San Francisco
City looking into reports of grafters hitting fruit trees.


Guerrilla Grafters are hitting the streets and taking on the city of San Francisco.

The San Francisco Examiner reports a group of about two dozen people have fanned out across four San Francisco neighborhoods, grafting fruit-producing branches on city pear and plum trees. The trees are supposed to be ornamental.

The head of the group told the Examiner seeing free fruit in the city changes a person's attitude. She is hoping if a passerby sees a fruit, he or she picks it.

While the grafting does not hurt the trees, it is considered vandalism. The Public Works Department says the trees are not for grafting and the city considers such a thing vandalism. If caught, a person could be fined for damaging city property.

http://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/Guerilla-Grafters-Strike-San-Francisco-136657913.html

[RandySF]

1. I don't mind fruit trees in the city.

But we should plant them, not graft branches onto them.

[Liberal_in_LA]

3. "authorities" don't like the mess of real fruit bearing trees.

[GoCubsGo]

6. They also don't like the homeless people those trees would attract.

Free food. Can't have that.

[sufrommich]

9. Or the slip and fall lawsuits that would

come with them.

[Retrograde]

12. Almost all fruit trees are grafted

Fruit trees generally don't grow true to type from seeds, so branches from the desired variety are grafted onto a known, vigorous, hopefully healthy rootstock. /horticulture_lesson.

I'm of two minds. Yes, it would be nice to have fruiting trees in a city, but they created their share of problems. There are a number of cities in the Bay Area that have fruiting gingko trees downtown: they're edible, and I have seen people collecting the fruit, but if they fall and get stepped on/run over they make a sticky, smelly mess. A park near me has a persimmon tree: the squirrels love it, but since the fruits are too big for them they eat about half of each one and drop the rest. If the trees were in a residential neighborhood where the locals could harvest the fruit when ready that would be great, but if they're on Market or another congested street I can understand why the city wants the non-fruiting kind.

BTW, if the grafters don't know what they're doing it can harm the trees.

[Nuclear Unicorn]

20. You can lead a horticulture

but you can't make her think

[Lochloosa]

25. How many years have you been waiting to use that one?

[Nuclear Unicorn]

26. My dad made that one a staple in our house, although he used the conventional spelling, speech-wise

Reading the thread just made it pop into my mind.

[roguevalley]

15. I grew up in fruit country and grafted trees all the time. Its awesome.

[Uncle Joe]

2. I would think fruit and nut trees in a city would be a good idea.

Thanks for the thread, Liberal_in_LA.

[Liberal_in_LA]

4. I would love seeing fruit trees everywhere.

[izquierdista]

21. The nuts?

Don't we have enough of them running for office?

[Brickbat]

5. Meh, I'd rather see them work with the city instead of just doing it.

Fruit trees that overproduce can be a huge pain in the ass -- messy and drawing vermin. Depending on where the trees are, it might be better that they stay ornamental.

[GoCubsGo]

11. Anyone who has been to Phoenix during the citrus season knows that.

I have never seen such a waste in my life. People have citrus trees in their yards. And, many of them just let the stuff fall to the ground and rot. In some neighborhoods, one can just walk down the street with a bag and pick perfectly good lemons and oranges off the sidewalks. The rest, as you point out, get messy and draw vermin. I don't know why they don't have a program that lets food bank volunteers come and pick the fruits.

[Uncle Joe]

14. I would think in a densely populated area, overproduction of fruit would be a minimal issue.

With increasing numbers of people depending on food banks, this along with intercity gardens on vacant lots could be a decent supplement.

[SpankMe]

7. I like this.

Maybe we can use the same "guerrilla tactics" to graft a brain on to Republicans in local neighborhoods.

[Aerows]

17. You have to have fertile ground for that

I don't think the shit for brains most of them have counts.

[MineralMan]

8. Back in the 1970s, I proposed that the city and county where I lived plant

productive fruit and nut trees on city and county property whenever a tree was replaced. The proposal was shot down by the city council as "impractical." When I asked what was impractical about the suggestion, they had no answer. The county never responded at all.

Oh, well. My "Johnny Dopeseed" effort was more effective.

[sufrommich]

10. Maybe city property away from pedestrian traffic

would be OK, but unless they can afford to hire clean up crews when they fruit,it really is impractical.

[MineralMan]

16. That's funny, considering that one of the main downtown streets

had olive trees planted on them. The mess they created was monumental.

[sufrommich]

18. That was bad planning on someones part. There

is a reason you never see fruiting trees around schools,too many kids get hurt in slip and falls around them.

[MineralMan]

19. The city was very proud of their olive trees.

They didn't clean up after them, but they were proud of them. We had a Mission in town, and they were historic, or so they said.

I was thinking more about trees in the city and county parks, though. They didn't replace street trees that often. There was another street in town that had carob trees. Another failure.

[izquierdista]

22. It would be "impractical"

It would be "impractical" to hire day labor to harvest the fruits and nuts.
It would be "impractical" to hire day labor to process the harvest and pack it for sale.
It might be a liability for the city or county to sell food products.
It might be a liability for the city or county to give it to a food bank.

No, better to leave it to the wild animals or rot.

[MineralMan]

23. The idea was that people could pick it for themselves and

for their own use.

[TwilightGardener]

13. Then someone would have to spray those, or otherwise work to keep pests off. I have an

apple tree--I don't spray. What fruit I get is not something you'd want to eat after a growing season. I can understand the city not allowing this potential damage to their trees (which aren't cheap) for questionable gain.

[Retrograde]

24. California's relatively pest-free

Surrounded by desert, mountains and ocean the fertile parts of the state are something of a botanical island - and wants to keep it that way. That's why you see "can not ship to California" in a lot of plant catalogs, and why have to stop at agricultural inspection stations when driving into the state, and see all the insect monitoring traps in trees. I don't spray, and don't see much if any insect damage to my fruits or veggies (squirrels and birds and raccoons are another thing). It's not like buying produce at a farmers' market back east and having to cut away a lot of bug-eaten parts. So, yes, SF can expect a decent-sized crop without maintenance.

[yellowcanine]

27. Why don't they just allow it where it obviously does no harm? This is a prime example of boneheaded

rigid adherence to "policy" just for the sake of following policy. Why not instead draw up some reasonable agreement with the budding horticulturalists? Maybe plant whole grafted fruit trees in parks around the city? The horticulturalists agree to take care of the trees, apply organic sprays to them, etc. Have them post a bond that would pay to remove the trees if they get neglected. There are ways to do things like this.

[Liberal_in_LA]

28. More: Renegade arborists creating forbidden fruit in San Francisco

Renegade arborists creating forbidden fruit in San Francisco

Guerrilla Grafters, which formed last year, is grafting fruit-producing branches to ornamental pear and plum trees around The City.

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“When you take a stroll down the street and there’s all this free fruit, it changes your attitude,” said Tara Hui, one of the founders of Guerilla Grafters.

Guerrilla Grafters began early last year when a few dozen members fanned out across The City grafting fruit-producing branches onto ornamental pear and plum trees in four San Francisco neighborhoods. The experiment is still in its early stages, but Hui said at least one Asian pear in Hayes Valley had flowered.

“We were so fortunate,” she said. “It formed two little pears!”

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Hui said such grafting won’t harm trees. Guerrilla Grafters, which is working on an urban orchard database, assigns a steward to oversee each tree, collecting fruit, pruning it and looking for disease.

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Hui acknowledged that fruit trees are messy when their fruit goes uncollected, but she felt sure that San Franciscans will pick whatever fruit they came across.


Read more at the San Francisco Examiner: http://www.sfexaminer.com/local/2012/01/renegade-arborists-hope-sow-fruit-trees-san-francisco#ixzz1iWjzdGqM