Happy Apple Trees

In preparation for the colder months, in appreciation of our sponsors (especially Coast of Maine, FedCo and Adams County Nursery, and in honor of Johnny Appleseed's birthday yesterday...I gave our nursery some extra love today.

Our apples, cherries, peaches and plums were happy this summer to be weeded by my brother, who was here for our wedding and meanwhile earned the title of a legendary, extraordinary, ReTreeUS volunteer. He opened up extra space and made sure the trees were receiving adequate sun and water.

Today, I cleared more clover from the trees he didn't have time to weed, added compost to those he had weeded, and put up more fabric to deter deer from hopping over our nursery fence. (Challenges like fencing seem more and more worth the risk for hungry deer in the winter months, and I suspect that time will be here before we know it.)

You'll see the fabric on our deer fence in the background of this photo from our wedding day.

The fabric surrounding our nursery provides a creative and chemical-free warning to deer who might not otherwise notice that the height of our fence is (just barely) too high for them to jump over. Which helps us out because saplings are a fawn's favorite treat.

We have sort of taken a Johnny Appleseed approach to the deer problem by planting hundreds of trees outside our fence. Hopefully, the deer will have enough crab apples outside the nursery that they won't be tempted by our larger, grafted trees inside.


It is appropriate, on this celebration of good old Johnny's birthday, that FedCo and Adams County Nursery have renewed their support for ReTreeUS by donating more large and healthy fruit trees to be planted in this year's orchards. Many thanks to those loyal businesses, as well as our new sponsor: Coast of Maine! Not only do we have plenty of trees for the school year, but we also now have more quality, organic compost to give last year's trees a boost.

In addition, BuildASign.com has sent off our educational signage, which we plan to install in last year's participating schools this fall.

We look forward to visiting those 1,000 students who helped us plants trees at their schools last year, and to meeting 1,000 more students this school year! We couldn't do it without our sponsors, our donors, our volunteers...which includes many of you who read our blog! Thank you for your support, and for helping us grow a healthier planet.

Fallready?

For those of us working and volunteering with ReTreeUS, the brightly colored trees and cooler temperatures of autumn really came by surprise. Is it that time already?

Turns out, it really is!

...Time for visiting our four school orchards from last year, and installing our signs which will not only thank those who donated to our Kickstarter campaign, but will also teach students about some of most the basic reasons we plant fruit trees at all.

Here are a couple of designs we plan to use for one sign, which will be personalized for each participating school, acknowledging students, staff and special sponsors, etc. in the space provided:

Thanks to our sign sponsor, BuildASign.com, and Kickstarter donors, we will also install information about the history of apples in Maine (where all our schools are located at this time), pollination, and discerning a wormy or diseased apple, for example, from a few harmless spots.

Daniel Feller, whose blog can be found at www.takingontheyear.blogspot.com, constructed benches for each school where students can sit and observe or enjoy the serenity of the space they helped create.

Meanwhile, four new schools are on board to receive orchards this school year, and many more are on the wait list for future years! We are thankful (but not surprised) that many schools see the value of producing food locally and educating their students about environmental values.

With the support of our scholastic partners, volunteers, sponsors and members, ReTreeUS is fallready to dive into a second exciting school year!

Fruit Shack, Baby

This summer was a whirlwind of harvests, floral bursts and celebrations! With the invaluable help of our intern, Shelley Hodges, as well as other friends, volunteers, and family, ReTreeUS co-founders sold dozens of sunflower bouquets from our Fruit Shack, nurtured 1,000 fruit trees throughout the summer, and finished the season with a wedding on the ReTreeUS farm!

Our ReTreeUS farm stand sign, handcrafted by friend and volunteer Daniel Feller. 

Our Fruit Shack farm stand represents our mission to create greater access to locally-grown, chemical-free produce to families of all income-levels. This is just one project of ReTreeUS, which also installs educational orchards and leads educational programming in schools.

Now, we begin the new school year and look forward to fall with a new set of schools on the docket to receive educational orchards, and a plan for enhancing our existing school orchards and programs.

Co-founder Richard Hodges waters kale and amaranth.

Co-founder Moriah Salter brings in a bundle of sunflowers to sell for donations and revenue at our farm stand in Durham, Maine.

If you or someone you know is interested in receiving an educational orchard at a New England school, visit www.retreeus.org to apply for our 2013-14 roster. (We have already filled all available slots for 2012-13!) Many thanks to our sponsors for making these orchards and programs possible.