Garden gleaning can help feed hungry
An estimated 27 percent of all the food produced in the United States each year goes to waste.
This includes the unused apples that fall from your backyard tree, grocery store food that passes its expiration date, or fruit and vegetables that sit too long in the produce aisle. According to the Department of Agriculture, 49 million people could be fed with our wasted food.
One solution to the problem is the ancient, often overlooked tradition of gleaning. The term refers to the collection of leftover crops either from farmers’ fields that have been mechanically harvested or from fields where it’s not economically profitable to harvest due to low market prices.
If you like the idea of gleaning but aren’t sure how to get involved, think about any friends or neighbors who may have gardens or fruit trees and ask if you can gather any leftovers to donate to local food banks. “We can use anything fresh,” says Alice Wallace, director of the Bonner Community Food Center. “Especially onions and potatoes because you can do so much with them … baked potatoes, potato soup, and of course onions are an all-time seasoning.”
If you’d like to help without leaving home, then plan to glean your own garden by donating whatever you can’t use. Better yet, plant an extra row with the specific intent of donating to your local food bank. The Plant a Row for the Hungry campaign is sponsored by the Garden Writers’ Society. Last year, the Bonner Country Master Gardeners decided to sponsor their own local chapter of Plant a Row.
“I heard about the progress of Plant a Row in Spokane,” said Ann Warwick, who spearheaded the program in Sandpoint. “It was inspiring, and I realized how many fruit trees in Sandpoint never get harvested, the fruit lying on the ground to rot, and how many gardens still have edible produce when the owners have harvested their fill. I simply brought it up at a Master Gardener meeting, and the group was enthusiastic.”
The initial goal for 2006 was to gather 1,500 pounds of fresh fruit and produce, but thanks to the generosity of local gardeners, more than 4,570 pounds were donated to various food banks in Bonner County.
“The great thing about this program is its simplicity,” said Warwick. “Even the paperwork is simple. The food bank fills out a receipt for the donor – the produce is tax deductible at $1.50 per pound. One copy of the receipt goes to the donor, the other is saved by the food bank until a representative of the Master Gardeners picks it up.”
With seed catalogs arriving daily, now is the perfect time to plan a garden that will produce not only what you need but a little extra besides. Stick in an additional tomato or zucchini plant, an extra row of carrots or hill of potatoes, and designate them as Plant a Row for the Hungry volunteers. Make sure to involve your kids, too. They especially like to plant big seeds like beans, squash, corn and pumpkins. Not only will they learn how to grow some of their own food, they’ll also learn how to contribute to their community. And don’t worry that the food bank may not be able to store all these fresh fruits and vegetables. “We have a big walk-in freezer and refrigerators,” said Wallace. “Plenty of storage.”
Aside from helping the hungry, another result of the Plant a Row program is that the Bonner County Master Gardeners were able to create a “learning garden” on the grounds of the University of Idaho Extension Office. The garden demonstrates various methods of growing vegetable above ground, in raised beds, containers and straw bales. They also built a small pond from an old bathtub disguised with rocks and water plants. This year, the Master Gardeners plan to donate the produce from this garden to the food bank as part of Plant a Row.
“It’s easy to get enthusiastic about saving food that would be wasted,” says Warwick. “And about … better nutrition for many local families.”