Event date: December 11, 2010

Next time you walk or drive around your neighborhood, take a look around. How many fruit trees do you notice? I bet there are at least a couple. Right now, you’ll probably see a lot of fruit, ripe or nearly ripe.

Have you ever wondered what happens to all that fruit? I never did, until I volunteered with Harvest Sacramento as part of last year’s 20 Causes, 20 Days.

Harvest Sacramento is a subsidiary of Soil Born Farms, and is devoted to harvesting extra fruit from neighborhoods and providing that extra fruit to local food banks.

It’s a simple concept that was made a reality by a couple in East Sacramento who grew tired of seeing all the fruit go to waste every spring.

Their idea became Harvest Sacramento. Headed up by Randy Stannard, Harvest Sacramento has harvested and provided more than 39,000 pounds of fruit to local food banks over the past two years.

No small feat, considering the majority of that fruit would have gone to waste otherwise.

I had such a great time last year that it was a no-brainer to include Harvest Sacramento in this year’s 20 Causes, 20 Days again this year.

I met up with Randy at the Sacramento Food Bank, and shortly thereafter Vic and Amy arrived. Diana came walking up with a big smile on her face, and Sanya and Suzanne showed up shortly thereafter.

Randy explained our tasks for the day, and as he spoke we could all feel the energy and passion with which he goes about his job. What a fun job to have! Being outside most of the day, meeting people who are grateful to provide a lot of their extra fruit to needy families, which in turn also saves them cleanup.

We followed Randy’s van, loaded with five ladders, a big bin of gloves and trimmers, dozens of cardboard boxes, and a digital scale, to the first stop. On this day, we would be focusing on harvesting persimmons. There are a lot of citrus trees in this area, but their fruit was not quite ripe on this day.

The persimmons were plenty ripe. Many were very squishy, and were deemed too soft to provide to food banks. The harder fruits were put into 40-pound boxes and the soft fruit that hadn’t been pecked at by birds or squirrels was placed aside for immediate consumption.

Everyone was enjoying the fruit, so I figured I’d give it a taste. Persimmons are an interesting taste, to say the least. Not wanting to feel left out, I took one small bite, and that was enough for me. I had had them before, but didn’t really like either the taste or texture.

Diana, on the other hand, couldn’t get enough of them. She was beaming with excitement at being able to harvest these fruit for hungry people, in addition to being able to enjoy as many ripe juicy persimmons as she could handle. It was a lot of fun to see and feel her energy, which was very contagious.

We all had a great time at all our stops. We ended up going to four houses in all, and we shared a lot of laughs at each. The persimmons got us pretty sticky and orange, but considering the fun we had, it was well worth it.

In all, we ended up harvesting 325 pounds of persimmons on this day.

Everyone had a great time. As this project progresses, human nature becomes more and more amazing to me. When people from many different walks of life come together under the guise of working together to help the greater good, it creates a powerful, great energy.

It reaffirms my belief that there is a lot of good in people and it warms my heart to realize that I’m helping bring that out in them.

Harvest Sacramento is always looking for volunteers, especially in the next few weeks as the citrus trees become ripe. I highly recommend you take an afternoon to join this great cause, who knows what you’ll learn about yourself. Join them at the volunteer orientation on December 18^th, or contact Randy directly. Volunteer information is below.

Thanks to Randy and Harvest Sacramento for all their hard work to be a bountiful resource to our local food banks, as well as helping make sure that thousands of pounds of fruit doesn’t go to waste.

Next time you see a fruit tree, ask yourself what will happen to all that fruit. Take the initiative to make sure it doesn’t go to waste. One small effort on your part could help many hungry families and save some food from going to waste.

Harvest Sacramento
Soil Born Farms
Volunteer Information
530.204.8082

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