Fruit For Our Children

By Dana Louise Stewart

What a great day we had with our guest actor and musician Greg Cipes.  Greg was visiting New Zealand as part of the Armageddon Expo and came to visit us to plant fruit trees.  The children were so excited and had so much fun, learning how easy it is to plant fruit trees.  We had great discussions on what that would and can provide for our future and the children were so inspired they were all going home to ask their parents if they could plant more!  Thank you Greg for being such a positive inspiration to children all over the globe!  Remember that our future is in our own hands and taking the time to dedicate to such a great cause was much appreciated.  May it be an inspiration to many many more actors to get behind great charities to promote healthy, sustainable living for the future of our children.

Greg has also kindly donated the proceeds from one of his songs “Free Me” that showcases on the Real N’ Raw soundtrack to this trust.  Help to support fruit tree planting in NZ by visiting our itunes store or by purchasing the Real N’ Raw DVD/Soundtrack for the bargain price of $19.95 NZD.

Thanks to a $500 donation from Gull we were able to purchase 20 fruit trees to plant our first Fruit For Our Children fruit tree food forest.  A lot of fun was had over several planting b’s.  Chalice now has an amazing back yard with more than 20 planted fruit trees along with natives a vegetable patch and what was a grass lawn is now totally transformed to be able to provide fresh fruit for many many years to come.  Thanks to everyone who came and supported and Gull for donating to a great cause.

Children love to grow plants and the cape gooseberry is a favorite of my children, so easy to grow and they love to run out back and devour the fruit – plant yours today, it only takes 6 months for fruit and they are prolific little beauties that form in the shape of hearts with a golden skin.  

Origin: The cape gooseberry is native to Brazil but long ago became naturalized in the highlands of Peru and Chile and became identified with the region. It was being grown in England in 1774 and was cultivated by early settlers at the Cape of Good Hope before 1807. Soon after introduction to the Cape the plant was carried to Australia where it quickly spread into the wild. Seeds were taken to Hawaii before 1825 and the plant is naturalized on all the islands at medium and somewhat higher altitudes. Only in fairly recent times has the fruit received any attention in the continental U.S.

Adaptation: The cape gooseberry is an annual in at temperate regions and a perennial in the tropics. In the Andean regions of South America it grows wild between 2,500 and 10,000 ft. The wild range in Hawaii is 1,000 to 8,000 ft. The plants are frost tender and are killed at temperatures of about 30° F. In much of California the cape gooseberry is best grown as an annual, but will persist for several years in frost-free areas of southern California. Some California growers have grown seedling materials under glass during the fall and winter and set out in early spring to gain the advantage of the longest possible growing season.The plants are easily grown in pots and adapt well to greenhouse culture.

DESCRIPTION

Growth Habit: The cape gooseberries is a soft-wooded, perennial, somewhat vining plant usually reaching 2 to 3 ft. in height. Under good conditions it can reach 6 ft. but will need support. The purplish, spreading branches are ribbed and covered with fine hairs.

Foliage: The heart-shaped, nearly opposite leaves are 2-1/2 to 6 inches long. They are slightly velvety when compared with the narrower and smoother leaves of the tomatillo.

Flowers: Bell-shaped, nodding flowers form in the leaf axils. They are yellow in color with dark purple-brown spots in the throat, and cupped by a purplish-green, hairy calyx. Fruit buds are produced after 12 to 13 stem internodes are formed.

Fruit: After the flower falls, the calyx expands, forming a straw-colored husk much larger than the fruit enclosed, which take 70 to 80 days to mature. The fruit is a berry with smooth, waxy, orange-yellow skin and juicy pulp containing numerous very small yellowish seeds. As the fruits ripen, they begin to drop to the ground, but will continue to mature and change from green to the golden-yellow of the mature fruit. The unripe fruit is said to be poisonous to some people. Cape gooseberries are self-pollinated but pollination is enhanced by a gentle shaking of the flowering stems or giving the plants a light spraying with water.

CULTURE

Location: The plant likes a sunny, frost-free location, sheltered from strong winds. It does well planted next to a south-facing wall or in a patio.

Soil: The cape gooseberry will grow in any well drained soil but does best on sandy to gravelly loam. Very good crops are obtained on rather poor sandy ground.

Irrigation: The plant needs consistent watering to set a good fruit crop, but can’t take “wet feet”. Where drainage is a problem, the plantings should be on a gentle slope or the rows should be mounded. Irrigation can be cut back when the fruits are maturing. The plants become dormant during drought.

Fertilization: The cape gooseberry seems to thrive on neglect. Even moderate fertilizer tends to encourage excessive vegetative growth and to depress flowering. High yields are attained with little or no fertilizer.

Pruning: Very little pruning is needed unless the plant is being trained to a trellis. Pinching back of the growing shoots will induce more compact and shorter plants.

Frost Protection: In areas where frost may be a problem, providing the plant with some overhead protection or planting them next to a wall or a building may be sufficient protection. Individual plants are small enough to be fairly easily covered during cold snaps by placing plastic sheeting, etc. over a frame around them. Plastic row covers will also provide some frost protection for larger plantings. Potted specimens can be moved to a frost-secure area.

Propagation: The plant is widely grown from seed. There are 5,000 to 8,000 seeds per ounce, which are sometimes mixed with pulverized soil or ashes for uniform sowing. High humidity is required for good germination. The plants can also be propagated from 1 year old stem cuttings treated with a rooting hormone. Plants grown this way flower early and yield well but are less vigorous than seedlings.

Pest and Diseases: Cape gooseberries are bothered by several diseases, including Alternaria spp. and powdery mildew. The plants are also prone to root rots and viruses when grown on poorly drained soil. A host of insect pests also attack the plants, namely cut worm, stem borer (Heliotis suflixa), leaf borer (Epiatrix spp.), fruit moth (Phthorimaea), Colorado potato beetle, flea beetle and striped cucumber beetle (Acalymma vittata). Greenhouse grown plants are attacked by white fly and aphids. The stored fruit can be adversely affected by Penicillium andBotrytis molds.

Harvest: The fruit is harvested when it falls to the ground, but not all fallen fruits may be in the same stage of maturity and must be held until they ripen. It may take some experience to tell when the calyx-enclosed fruits are fully ripe. Properly matured and prepared fruits will keep for several months.

The ripe fruit can be eaten out of hand or used in a number of other ways. The unique flavor of the fresh fruit makes it an interesting ingredient in salads and cooked dishes. Cape gooseberries cooked with apples or ginger make a very distinctive dessert. The fruits are also an attractive sweet when dipped in chocolate or other glazes or pricked and rolled in sugar. The high pectin content makes cape gooseberry a good preserve and jam product that can be used as a dessert topping. The fruit also dries into tasty “raisins”.

Have just read a great article that shows how sometimes a challenging situation can close one door and open another to a more fruitful future.  Enjoy Dana

Mansfield’s all-time champion fruit grower was Jacob Deane of Fruit Street. As I’m sure you’ve already figured out, the street took its name from his extensive orchards. Until the mid-1800s, Fruit Street was called, for reasons clear only to our forebears, the Medfield High Road.

Jacob started out by teaching school in Taunton. That town’s wealthiest citizen, whose teenage son attended his classes, took a dislike to the young Mansfield man and decided he had to go. He ordered the son, who was a big kid, to beat up the teacher. Male schoolmasters in those days had to be skilled pugilists and wrestlers. Jacob flattened the boy. The father pressed charges. A judge ruled in Dean’s favor, greatly enhancing his local popularity, because nobody liked the old man or the son.

Perhaps irresistably drawn by the lure of his ancestral lands, Jacob, after teaching in Taunton, Easton, Stoughton and Mansfield, gave up his career as an educator and became a horticulturist.

Jennie Copeland tells us, “He sold his Greek and Latin books, in which he had been delving for the roots of languages, and turned his attention to the roots in the soil of the old homestead.”

From his father, John Dean, Jacob had inherited the house and 135 acres of farmland on what was called Eight Mile Plain. Overlaid on a modern map of Mansfield, his estate would swallow our municipal airport plus adjoining land on both sides of Fruit Street. On this tract Deane planted 100 varieties of apple trees, as well as cherry, peach, pear, plum and mulberry trees. The presence of the latter suggests that he may have been one of the many farmers to experiment with raising silkworms, which feed on mulberry leaves.

Some of his fruit trees he imported from England. Maybe in this connection, he wrote Queen Victoria about trees, though there’s no evidence that Her Majesty, who had matters of Empire on her mind, deigned to reply. Jacob also opened a nursery where he sold ornamental and fruit trees. To increase his farm’s diversity, he hired East Mansfield’s universal man, Isaac Stearns, to graft trees for him.

In 1835, when Jacob Deane was 55, the Taunton Branch Rail Road decided they wanted to run a track through his land. The railroad would connect the Boston & Providence rails at Mansfield depot with Taunton and eventually with the rich whaling port of New Bedford.

“No way!” was Jacob’s response. He was convinced that smoke from the wood-burning locomotives would blight the orchards to which he’d devoted so much of his life. He hadn’t yet learned what all Florida citrus growers know – that smoke helps protect fruit trees from frost.

The corporation realized that Jacob had them over a barrel. His estate was too big to detour around. If he persisted in stonewalling them, they might as well take their trains and go home. Rather than get embroiled in a long costly court dispute, they sweetened the deal.

They told Jacob they’d build him an 8 by 12-foot private station where he, his family and relatives, simply by displaying a flag, could stop any train and get aboard. It may have been the only private passenger depot on a U.S. public railway. Not only that, the company presented him with a handsomely engraved lifetime pass, good for himself and his family, bearing railroad president Thomas B. Wales’ ornately scrolled signature.

Jacob caved. In 1836, trains began running regularly through his property. They did no harm to his fruit trees. The station and the free pass served him until he died in 1871 at age 91.

In 1917, the historic Deane house burned. The foundation hole and the walled lane by which Jacob Deane reached his private depot are now obscured by a housing development.

I was talking to my children as we walked to school this morning on how people were ridiculed for thinking that the world was round.  That sometimes even though many people don’t believe in something that it does not necessarily equate to not being true.  It lead me to think that in another 500 years that the future generations will look back at this time on earth and think we were crazy for not planting more fruit trees and eating as nature intended.  My 9 year old daughter turned to me and commented that it is perfectly obvious the world is not flat “mummy all they would have to do would be to look at the moon or look at the horizon, where would all the water go!”

Ok so moral of the story, perhaps eating healthy food and empowering our bodies with nutritious food enables our brains to function better and we are able to think more clearly.  

Would love to hear your comments.

Just read a fascinating article on corporate agriculture and hence why it is so important to start and act on the change we want to see in the world.  I always say, talking is easy,  putting things into action and seeing the changes come about through those steps we make eg. planting fruit trees is where we start to see the magic take place.  My favorite quote from the article

“…You cannot enrich a country by destroying the health of its population. The health of a society cannot be measured by corporate profitability…”

The idea is to create what is known today as efficient agriculture and to impose it worldwide. Let me just give you one [impact] of GATT on the third world. The idea of GATT is that the efficiency of agriculture throughout the world should …produce the most amount of food for the least cost. But what does that really mean? …What is cost? 

When you produce the intensified agriculture and you reduce the number of people on the land, what happens to those people?…They are chased into the towns. They lose their jobs on the land. If they go into the towns, there are no jobs, there is no infrastructure. The social costs of those people, the financial costs of the infrastructure has to be added to the cost of producing food.

On top of that, you are breaking families, you are uprooting them, you are throwing them into the slums. Do you realize that in Brazil, the favelas (slums) did not exist before the Green Revolution of intensifying agriculture.

In the world today there are 3.1 billion people still living in rural communities. If GATT succeeds and we are able to impose modern methods of agriculture worldwide, so as to bring them to the level of Canada or Australia, what will happen? 2.1 billion people will be uprooted from the land and chased into the towns throughout the world. It is the single greatest disaster [in our history] greater than any war.

We have to change priorities. Let’s take agriculture. Instead of just trying to produce the maximum amount for the cheapest direct costs, let us try to take into account the other costs. Our purpose should not be just the one dimensional cost of food. We want the right amount of food, for the right quality for health and the right quality for the environment and employing enough people so as to maintain social stability in the rural areas.

If not, and we chase 2.1 billion people into the slums of the towns, we will create on a scale unheard of mass migration – what we saw in Rwanda with 2 million people will be nothing — so as to satisfy an economic doctrine. … We would be creating 2 billion refuges. We would be creating mass waves of migration which none of us could control. We would be destroying the towns which are already largely destroyed. Look at Mexico, Rio, look at our own towns.

And we are doing this for economic dogma?…What is this nonsense? Everything is based in our modern society on improving an economic index…The result is that we are destroying the stability of our societies, because we are worshiping the wrong god… Economic index.

The economy, like everything else, is a tool which should be submitted to, should be subject to, the true and fundamental requirements of society.

…This is the establishment against the rest of society… I am for business, so long as it does not devour society…[But] we have a conflict of interest. Big business loves having access to an unlimited supply of give away labor…

…You cannot enrich a country by destroying the health of its population. The health of a society cannot be measured by corporate profitability…

…We have allowed the instruments that are supposed to serve us to become our masters.

Check out Catherine Austin Fitts’ at http://solari.com

Thumbs up to more of the following happening in New Zealand and throughout the world where we continue to come together to create fun, working projects to empower and strengthen communities by growing and planting fruit trees.

The full Monty: This Monty’s Surprise apple, discovered by Wanganui accountant Mark Christensen, is another weapon in the fight against cancer. Research into the anti-cancer properties of apples has placed this variety at the top of the list. The humble apple may be your best defence against cancer. 
Seedling and heritage varieties of apples are the ones that ‘‘pack the most punch” when it comes to stopping the growth of colon and stomach cancer cells. 

The New Zealand Tree Crops Association held its national conference in Cromwell during the weekend and one of the speakers was Wanganui member Mark Christensen, who outlined research into the anticancer properties of apples, initiated by the association’s Central Districts branch. 

‘‘Our work is based on the hypothesis that for every disease affecting human health, there will be a plant with the necessary compounds to treat the disease,” Mr Christensen said. 

Mr Christensen, who is an accountant, has always been interested in growing heritage apples and heirloom vegetable varieties. 

Six years ago, he discovered a seedling apple tree on a Wanganui country road when he stopped to ‘‘stretch his legs” on a long car trip. 

‘‘The tree was very old, judging by its girth and it was the oldest and largest apple tree I’d ever come across.” 

It appeared diseaseresistant and its fruit had good flavour. 

It was ‘‘one of a kind” and was later named Monty’s Surprise after an old identity in the district. 

Studies in Finland have already shown that people who ate five apples a week had the world’s lowest rate of diabetes, heart disease and cancer, so the Central Districts branch of the association decided to get 250 apple varieties tested for anti-cancer properties. 

Modern commercial varieties rated far lower than the best seedling and heritage varieties, while Monty’s Surprise topped the lot. 

Scientists in France and Australia as well as in this country are involved in further studies into the health benefits of the Monty’s Surprise apple. 

‘‘Everyone’s been excited by the initial results of the studies and it seems that a very small amount is effective in inhibiting the growth of cancer cells,” Mr Christensen said. 

He is the research director of a charitable trust that has been established to carry out further apple studies. 

By this winter, the trust will have grown and given away 5000 Monty’s Surprise apple trees. 

In a joint venture with Wanganui health authorities, the trust has been working to distribute the variety as widely as possible and to get stocks grafted to meet expected future demand. 

Modern apple breeding programmes appeared to focus on ‘‘superficial” criteria, such as looks, handling and storage, forgetting that good flavour was often an indication of the nutritional value of the fruit, Mr Christensen said. 

The initial research showed that older apple varieties and fruit from seedlings ‘‘packed more of a punch” than newer commercial varieties when it came to triggering ‘‘cell suicide” in tumour cells. 

‘‘Cancer is in your body for a long time before it gets to the point where there are enough cells for it to be detected,” he said. 

The trust is also carrying out similar research into the antioxidant properties of heirloom tomatoes and studying a natural extract from a desert plant that may delay the onset of Huntington’s disease. 

By Lynda Van Kempen on Thu, 3 Apr 2008
The News – Lakes District & Central Otago