Traces of our Johnny Appleseeds

[boatman]

A friend of ours who lived in a woodland cottage for years also spent some time touring around Britain on her motorbike. One of her food sources were the wild apple trees seeded from discarded apple cores, presumably. She is plotting the location of such apple trees from, at first, London to Cornwall. Apart from being interesting in itself it could be a useful foraging guide. of course places change but wild trees tend to remain.


Does anyone know of other initiatives showing good sites for free grub?

 

[Toddy]

What a lovely idea
We know a few trees round here like that, we think they were from fruit cores thrown from passing trains in the pre Beeching cuts days.
There's a pear that Himself collects for me every year and there are loads of apples and plums around too.

M

 

[Robson Valley]

Western Canada really doesn't much more than 150 years of European influence and activity.
In many places, a lot less than that, other than gold rush days of opportunity.
Apple trees, essentially in the middle of nowhere, are common evidence of some attempted habitation.
You might find some foundation stones in the long grass but that's all.

Old timers in my village can recall someone coming through long ago and planting apple trees here and there.
Unfortunately, several of those have been removed in the cause of progress.

There is a very small apple, a "crab-apple" which is native to British Columbia.
20(?) years ago, YVR, the Vancouver International Airport underwent a massive expansion.
Prior to work on a new runway, the entire area was really scrutinized for both plants and animals
which would need to be relocated if possible. In that day and time, I was privy to the details of the work.

The searchers came upon many Pacific Crab Apple trees, a grove of them, planted in rows!
They were marked for geographic orientation and the entire grove was moved using tree spades.