A charity that traces its roots to picking fruit off the ground in North Portland has grown into an organization with much, much larger ambitions.
The Portland Fruit Tree Project launched in 2006 as the Neighborhood Fruit Tree Project and within a year had changed to its current name.
And in 2020, “we changed our emphasis,” executive director Heather Keisler Fornes said.
Now, its stated mission is to promote food justice, prevent food waste and strengthen communities, a bit more ambitious goal than gleaning apples from a neighborhood sidewalk.
Which the organization still does, too.
But it’s also, Keisler Fornes said, mapping fruit trees in the city, filling in “a lot of canopy gaps” (especially in lower-income neighborhoods), instructing people on how to care for their trees, identifying those who want access to fresh fruit but don’t have it and providing food preservation guidance with instructions on freezing and pickling.
Not to mention heading an effort to plant “100 fruit trees east of 82nd Avenue by partnering with local community organizations,” according to the Tree Project’s Joseph Nontanovan. “We source the trees, plant them and provide two to three years of care” to get them off to a good start.
Joseph Nontanovan, a harvest lead for the Portland Fruit Tree Project, oversees a fall harvest at a residential apple orchard in Milwaukie. Jamie Hale/The Oregonian
Amy Vanacore, a volunteer with the Portland Fruit Tree Project, cleans up spoiled apples in a Milwaukie backyard during a fall harvest. Jamie Hale/The Oregonian
And, of course, they pick fruit. A lot of fruit. The organization, which has a Multnomah County focus but has done work in Clackamas and Washington counties as well, estimates it has harvested more than 413,640 pounds over the past 14 years with a market value of more than a half-million dollars.
While donations and grants help keep the Tree Project going, it’s the volunteers who keep it growing.
Keisler Fornes estimates that 12,000 people have volunteered over the years.
And much of what they do is pick fruit, often in residential yards, although a recent event had dozens of volunteers harvesting apples at the McMenamins’ Cornelius Pass Roadhouse.
The reasons they do it vary, but one definite benefit is that they get to keep some of the fruit they help harvest.
A residential crew of four volunteers — five, if you count a baby in a stroller, who seemed very interested in what was going on — took advantage of a cool October morning in Milwaukie to harvest apples and grapes for a very grateful homeowner, who donated the produce.
The best of the fruit is considered market ready. In this case, it’s going to MudBone Grown, a Black-owned farm enterprise that runs its own community-assisted agricultural operation in Corbett but does not — yet — grow its own fruit.
The next-best fruit, which the volunteers are welcome to take home, might have some bruises or other imperfections but is completely edible and “you can cook with it,” Nontanovan said.
For one volunteer, at least, though, it wasn’t about the fruit.
“The way I was raised,” Teresa Schechtel said, “you give back to your community.”
In addition to MudBone Grown, the Portland Fruit Tree Project has partnered with community organizations such as Familias en Accion and the Asian Food Pantry at the Community for Positive Aging/Hollywood Senior Center.
Judy Lee, who runs the Asian Food Pantry, said her group has worked with the Fruit Tree Project for two years, and “we have truly enjoyed the partnership.”
Asian seniors who live in low-income housing in downtown Portland are provided with what she calls “culturally specific fresh fruits,” such as Asian pears, plums and persimmons.
Especially the persimmons.
“Persimmons,” she explained, “are not popular with the majority culture in Portland, but they are treasured in East Asian cultures,” signifying good luck and longevity.
And when bought in stores, she said, “they’re also quite expensive.”
Familias en Accion has partnered with the Fruit Tree Project the past two summers, providing seasonal fruits for the Community Supported Agriculture boxes the organization distributes to Latino families experiencing food insecurity.
People interested in volunteering — harvest time is pretty much done for this year, though — can go to Portlandfruit.org and sign up. And homeowners interested in having their fruit donated can fill out a form on the same website and someone from the charity will scope out the project.
For a fee, the Portland Fruit Tree Project also offers instruction on how to prune and care for fruit trees to get the most out of them, something that needs to be done on some types of fruit trees (see tips for ones not to prune now) in the winter.
That can range from a one-hour do-it-yourself presentation to full-service, season-long maintenance.
One Green World, a nursery in outer Southeast Portland, has donated trees in the past and even did a pruning class.
Said One Green World horticulturist Sam Hubert: “I’ve always loved the idea of their work.”
Portland Fruit Tree Project
Where: 5431 N.E. 20th Ave., Portland
More information: Portlandfruit.org
A tree in a Milwaukie backyard is full of apples, ripe for a harvest by the Portland Fruit Tree Project, a nonprofit that empowers Portlanders to share in the harvest of urban fruit trees, aiming to combat food waste and hunger. Jamie Hale/The Oregonian
Tips for homeowners on how to care for their own fruit trees from tree care coordinator Sadie Wechsler of the Portland Fruit Tree Project.
1. Use clean sharp tools. Making clean cuts will help the tree compartmentalize or “heal” with more ease.
2. Sanitize them with bleach or alcohol in between trees. This will help stop the spread of disease from one tree to the next.
3. Only prune stone fruit in the dry months of summer. These trees are so susceptible to a fungal disease that it is best to only have open cuts when it is dry and the tree can start to recover.
4. Prune at most 30% of the tree in a given year. That is the amount that a tree can easily recover from if it is in good health.
5. Water your fruit trees about 15-20 gallons one time a week during the dry months of summer; on an exceptionally hot week you may want to water twice. By watering more deeply, less often you are promoting deep-root growth that will help the tree be more resilient and stable.
6. Arborist woodchips are one of the best ways to feed your fruit trees. They will break down and add beneficial microbes and nutrients to the soil while also helping to retain water.
— Dennis Peck, for The Oregonian/OregonLive
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