ReThinking abandoned orchards

Abandoned fruit trees in southwest London.

I often drive by the abandoned Cornell Orchard on Southdale Road just west of Colonel Talbot Road. The take-out where I buy a shawarma with fries is located where the old Cornell store once stood. It burned some years ago. There were rumors about the abandoned orchards, about the burning of the retail store, gossipy stories filled with murky facts swirling in a fog of local myth.

Recently, The London Free Press ran a story on the abandoned operation with a picture of the "tapped-out orchard" where "weeds grow between what were once rows of fruit trees." The story made me think about those abandoned trees and wonder why no one was interested in harvesting the apples. 

It could be there are legal issues preventing these particular trees from being cared for. But what about other orchards? Why is it not uncommon to see abandoned orchards in southwestern Ontario? Or to read stories about orchards being bulldozed? (Today, the fall of 2016, the former Cornell Orchard has been uprooted and the dead trees sit in large, piles in the cleared field.)

Apple growing in abandoned orchard.

With a little research I learned one should not be too quick to tear out orchards. Old fruit trees can be renovated and transformed both aesthetically and in terms of productivity. With some luck, a mature orchard can be encouraged to again produce fruit. 

But this gets harder and harder if the orchard is left untouched too long. Diseases will get firmly established, destructive insects will flourish and time will take its inevitable toll. So, why are our older orchards not being cared for and replanted when necessary? Read on.

I learned that apple trees originated in the Tien Shan mountains in southern Kazakhstan. The last surviving wild apple forests are to be found in those mountains in Central Asia. Those forests are now threatened by urbanization and modern agricultural methods. Many wild apple species are facing extinction.

If one wants to breed an apple for resistance to disease and to drought, the malus sieversii is a good apple to investigate. Thought to be the source species for many of today's farm grown varieties, the malus sieversii is on the list of endangered apple species, along with 44 other apple tree species found in Central Asia.

Over-exploitation and human encroachment are among the main threats to the forests of Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan and Tajikistan. These forests are home to more than 300 wild fruit and nut species including apple, plum, cherry, apricot and walnut. These valuable, unique, heritage trees are under threat.

Wild genes carry resistance to diseases such as apple scab, a fungus that can devastate crops. A lot of our domestic fruit supply comes from a very narrow genetic base, it is imperative that scientists are able to return to heritage fruit tree species for inclusion in breeding programmes. In the future, this may not be possible. The heritage trees are disappearing.

Sadly, the BBC reports these countries lack the resources to conserve their valuable trees. But there is nothing unique here. We don't seem to be able to protect our North American fruit tree species from the threat of extinction. The Gravenstein, a very old variety of apple first recorded in Denmark in 1607 and brought to the U.S. around 1826 was praised by Luther Burbank as one of the best apple varieties is facing extinction today.

Luther Burbank, the man who developed the Russet potato, once said, "The secret of improved plant breeding, apart from scientific knowledge, is love." As twenty-first century folk have moved from the land to the city, maybe we are losing our love for plants, for farming, for the world that produces the foods that keeps us healthy.

London, Ontario, sits in the middle of some of the richest farmland in the world. And yet, London is somewhat divorced from food production --- traditional food production. In fact, some food production today may be somewhat divorced from food. The Casco plant in London takes corn and after some fancy processing pumps out high fructose corn syrup. There are those who would argue that this sweet concoction from the lab is not food -- at least not a good use of food: corn.

Fruit is shipped to Canada from around the globe.

We no longer need Ontario fruit trees for fruit. Fresh pears can come from South America, and canned peaches from Greece. Apples come from lots of places except that in the future they may not come from Kazakhstan. Or from southwest London.

Read: The Toronto Star article, Ontario fruit growers losing ground

 

Many believe fruit growing operations are threatened in Southwest Ontario.