Someone e-mailed me last week with questions about how the fruit list worked - and I liked how I worded it at the time, so I've adapted it into a new summary of how this fruit group works.
In essence, this group functions as a phone tree.
Palatine Fruit in Niagara has a direct relationship with my distributor Tara.
The farm notifies Tara when and what fruit is available. Tara then passes on details and prices to me and several other groups like ours who submit their orders through Tara.
If you'd ever like to do the same, Tara will add anyone to her list willing to make a 5 case minimum order.
The fruit is picked and Tara arranges the transportation to her farm near Westport. I arrange transportation from Westport to Kingston and break down the cases into individual orders upon arrival.
In that sense it is sort of a community service. Without this, were all basically stuck going through grocery stores.
RE: "ORGANIC" Label.
The fruit is not certified organic, nor is it totally conventional either... it's somewhere in between. Stone fruit is VERY susceptible to pests. Their growing practices were explained to me as "As organic as possible" which counts for something in an industry that largely results to pesticides and herbicides as default.
While I don't have any communication with them directly. Their website offers the following blurb:
"We pursue organic methods whenever we practically can. We have been building up our soil health for over 20 years (high calcium applications, minimal commercial fertilizer, manure, green manure, cover crops, as well as foliar sprays like Growers and Vitanal). We believe soil health is the key to everything. We use pheromones where possible for insect control, as well as Neem Oil, essential oils and other organically approved sprays. There are some fungal issues (such as black knot in plums) and some insects for which we have no tools, yet, to deal with organically, and in these instances we use commercial non-organic sprays. We are in the process of setting up new orchards as permaculture orchards, and hope to be able to expand that concept."
The community member who ran this list before me did it on a volunteer basis and decided to pass it on when the list grew too large.
After running a couple orders myself, I learned the coordination time can be 6-12 hours, packing & pick-up time can be anywhere from 3 to 6 hours, and 3 hours for a driver + gas.
Because it takes up so much time on very short notice (I'm often given a week or less to put my group's order in) I decided to charge for everyone's time, pay my helpers and donate any surplus.
The exact pick up date and time options are always listed on the order form for each order period. The fruit is sorted and stored in my back yard on pick up day, which is not a "food facility" or anything like that. It is all really an informal arrangement in that sense.
For these reasons, please be kind. I'm not a food distribution professional. For the most part things go smoothly and the fruit is always worth it in the end!
Here's to full bellies, pantries and freezers!
