Just a bafflingly dumb response to such an obviously great thing to do.
This is the result of a century of propaganda and destruction of public spaces
My parents are happy when people pick fruits from the trees at the street. When they fall they rot no one except the wasps and insects have something from it.
No-good lazy workshy people stealing food from hardworking wasps 🤬🤬🤬🤬
I actually really appreciate the rational response to this that people have had about waste fruit, the rotting, and the food chain that follows the fallen fruit.
I had wanted to plant a few fruit trees in my front yard and allow neighbors to just take fruit off of it. Lots of people walk up my 0.5mi dead-end road.
But then I remembered what every PYO farm is like…tons of rotting fruits sitting at the bottom of all of them. And any apple someone picks that isn’t 100% perfect gets tossed in the pile.
That’s a lot of maintenance. Totally doable for an individual or small group to maintain a small patch. Gets really difficult to scale up.
It’s not terrible, but it’s also not great. Fruit trees by their nature produce just mountains of fruit for a single tree. I came from a large farming family and we had a few fruit trees. So much of it ends up on the ground and rotting (which, not so bad since it was in a field, a nightmare if it were in the suburbs).
If you really want one, you NEED to maintain the tree. That means cutting branches to make sure the tree doesn’t grow up and instead grows out. It also means constant maintenance to make sure branches aren’t overloaded (growing out means they have a higher risk of breaking).
Regular trees are already a PITA to take properly maintain, fruit trees are another level.
And even with all that, you’ll still end up with a bunch of rotting fruit on the ground. Birds, insects, etc will nibble at your fruits. You’ll simply miss the 50 fruit the ripened early or late. It’s just going to be a headache no matter what you do.
And it’s a lot of fruit. 1 tree can easily make enough fruit for 20 people. That comes in all at once.
It’s worth keeping in mind though, if you want to feed people: we can just do that, we have the food and we have the infrastructure. Every person going hungry in a city with edible food in bins, produce discarded for not looking right and so on is going hungry because of policy decisions.
It is cheaper, healthier, and more successful to just distribute the food we already grow, make and transport than trying to turn everything into an orchid.
Urban planning is tricky, some times nice ideas have super tricky executions. Planting fruit/food trees in public spaces also accounts for rodents and pests, and managing disease vectors. Was just reading about fruit bats and Marburg virus spread in Central Africa…, regardless, just something that needs to be done with planning and consideration https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2013/04/23/178603623/want-to-forage-in-your-city-theres-a-map-for-that
And things that people are allergic to, like wasps and bees
We should put public roads in our city.
Why, so people can just trespass everywhere?
There will atleast be 1 asshole trying to take all the apples for himself. I guarantee it
And if you actually read the Wikipedia article you linked:
The work of Elinor Ostrom, who received the Nobel Prize in Economics is seen by some economists as having refuted Hardin’s claims.[1] Hardin’s views on over-population have been criticised as simplistic[2] and racist. [3]
…
Hardin’s work is criticised as historically inaccurate in failing to account for the demographic transition,[191] and for failing to distinguish between common property and open access resources.[192][193] Environmentalist Derrick Jensen claims the tragedy of the commons is used as propaganda for private ownership.[194][195] He says it has been used by the political right wing to hasten the final enclosure of the “common resources” of third world and indigenous people worldwide, as a part of the Washington Consensus.[196]
…
Other criticisms have focused on Hardin’s racist and eugenicist views, claiming that his arguments are directed towards forcible population control, particularly for people of color.[210][211]
The “tragedy of the commons” is one of those things that’s very Intuitive, but doesn’t actually hold up to much scrutiny.
So the BLM lied about the (Cliven and sons) Bundy cattle degrading US property? No, I don’t sympathize with them, just saying the answer may be somewhere between each extreme. Key word: “may,” because I’m not a conservation scientist and people are people.
Opens Apple selling stand across the street.
God damn apple stealing whores…
Guess we can’t have anything nice as long as one person might be selfish.
I didn’t say we shouldn’t do it. I just wanted to point out that sadly one jerk will probably try and ruin it for everyone
We should bring back tar and feather punishments or maybe exile, for people who ruin good things so they can benefit more than anyone else
Meh, that’s why you plant an abundance. No value if you can’t steal at least most and probably be able to travel.
I grew up in a town with plenty of fruit naturally growing (blackberries especially, which grow like weeds) and having an abundance absolutely meant that no one tried to horde it all. You could pick 10 pounds of blackberries and barely make a dent in the amount in any given neighborhood.
That’s a good solution I didn’t really consider. Sad that my brain considers 1 apple tree already way more than any government might be willing to plant
These are the same people that run restaurants that will throw away perfectly good food instead of donating it and then keep their trash bins locked.
I used to live in a peaceful, quiet suburb. Eventually, a Panera appeared, as one does. At the end of each day, the Panera had a load of bread that was uneaten and un-purchased. The employees decided that the right thing to do was to give away the uneaten and un-purchased bread at the end of each day. I got some of it. Others did as well. It would be a waste otherwise! It would go into the dumpster, if nobody were to eat this delicious bread!
Those who were the most needy eventually got word of this free delicious bread. It began attracting ruffians. Travelers. Hobos, you know—homeless people. They traveled from the deeper parts of the city to seek this golden mana.
The locals didn’t approve of these dirty people migrating to our alcove and congregating about the back of the Panera every day. For some mere loaves of bread! It was depressing, and more importantly, it could affect our property values! What if they linger about and people think our city was one that not only catered to the lower people, but harbored them? And so, it was dealt with. The police helped to put a stop to it, bless their souls. We thank them for their service.
Now, the citizens of this peaceful city no longer have to view the sad visages of those who never learned how to play the game of our society. The excess bread may rot locked away in that dumpster, but it is the price we must pay for the cleanliness and uninterrupted peace we enjoy.
BIG /s. I typed this out so somebody may see how fucked-up this line of thinking is.
Presumably because everyone assumes the tragedy of the commons will happen as it always does. And, little red hen, there’s a sense that if one person does the work, they are owed the fruits of their labor
Plus having rotting fruit laying around will encourage pests. Maybe put these into specific areas rather than just scattering them around.
how do you explain this just… not being a problem that anyone talks about in areas where fruit trees are already plentiful in cities? I feel like people use the word “pests” the same way conservatives use the word “immigrants”, it’s just an abstract scapegoat to throw out whenever you want to argue against something…
You would just have people tend to the gardens no?
Some apple trees can produce hundreds of fruit a day. No you wouldn’t. That’s someone else’s problem. It takes massive organization and as you can see no one really cares enough.
https://nextcity.org/urbanist-news/cities-are-planting-trees-why-not-make-them-fruit-trees
A small example of the work needed. You’re not going to get this everywhere or forever and what happens when people stop. The trees don’t stop.
Yeah, my city has street sweepers and gardeners, so I wouldn’t imagine this would be a huge problem.
They could even put out compost bins like public trashcans. I wouldn’t mind cleaning up a couple of fruits here and there as I walk by.
If it’s in a public place in front of businesses and such, then the business has an incentive to keep things tidy. So all in all, I think it’s a fairly easy problem to solve.
Plus the employees and customers could enjoy the fruit. Free fruit already gathered may entice more customers for other things. I guess food stores may not like the idea.
I’m thinking about fruit trees and bushes specifically. If you’ve ever gone apple picking you see how many apples are on the ground. Domesticated fruit trees are bred and grafted to be highly prolific, and you’ll have a lot more fruit dropped than you’d think.
Plus you’ll have animals going into the trees to eat the fruit. Commercial berry farmers have to cover their bushes and trees with nets to prevent birds from picking them clean. (And then producing very colorful art on outdoor surfaces.)
I’m not saying it’s a bad idea, but I don’t think people have entirely thought it through.
this is already bog standard here in sweden and the only real problem is fucking MOOSE coming into people’s gardens to eat fruit, any other animals are too small for anyone to be bothered by them.
fallen fruit just isn’t a problem in the real world, it’s fine.
Literally the fruits in this case.
Talking about tragedy of the commons on the internet, in a decentralized network, is an extremely funny bit.
Do I need to mention that the guy who came up with it was a racist who wanted to justify displacing the “unproductives”?
To your first point, why? You know what the Internet is like outside the fediverse right?
To your second, I guess you can. Don’t know what it has to do with the subject at hand
It’s only a tragedy if allowing “first come, first served” until the resource is completely exhausted is actually a problematic outcome. For urban fruit trees intentionally planted for the public, I’d argue that that isn’t the case.
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What’s cool is we don’t even have to wait for the collapse, we can start working towards the greater good today!
Don’t work too hard you’ll end up in jail or shot
Fuck that’s depressing, but at the same time I think making a better world for people is something worth dedicating your life to.
Sorry :c
I mean, yeah…one of them is an attempt at a solution for the tragedy. It’s a logical step to protect things from others ruining it by saying it’s yours.
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But a fruit tree in a public space is like an open field or playground equipment in a public space. They are there for everyone, and people who complain that the ‘wrong people’ are using those public rrsources for personal use are selfish idiots.
Like if a company came in and took all the fruit, sure, that would be wrong. But someone taking apples to make a pie? That’s what it is there for.
What if one person comes in and takes it all? Don’t even need companies, just individuals.
That’s the tragedy of the commons.
What if the tree only produces 3 fruit, is it wrong for three siblings to pick and eat them?
Idk, you tell me. I’m suggesting that scarce resources not owned by anyone will get used by those who take it. This is a fact. What then? Is it bad? Is it ok? Pretending it’s not a thing is to deny reality and all of human/life history
Do you get this worked up over kids who spend too long on the swings?
So we shouldn’t have nice things because someone might act in bad faith?
That’s the thing though: someone will. That’s what regulations, ownership (collective or individual), and laws are for. That’s why it’s not a simple thing.
So instead of accounting for it, just don’t try?
What if I hire a dozen people to randomly, individually go and pick all the fruit and bring it to me, and then I make a profit reselling what they collect?
Then you’re an asshole
Well duh. Kind of missing the point though.
Lotta them exist. Always have and always will. This is how you begin the “have and have not” groups.
this is literally a legitimate business in the nordic forests thanks to the right to roam, people will hire (generally thai people) to go out into the forests and harvest berries and mushrooms on an industrial scale (by hand though) and then sell it to grocery stores or directly to people on the street…
and surprise surprise, i have never seen anyone complain about this. Rather people gladly pay their pretty cheap prices rather than going out and picking it themselves, and there’s more than enough available out in the forest that everyone can find some for theirselves if they want.
hell the law specifically gives you a tax break for selling fruits and berries you’ve personally picked, you can earn something like 25’000 SEK per year that way without needing to pay any tax on it.
This isn’t a fucking problem.
Unfortunately, we have bears around my parts. And bears like the fruit too, driving human bear conflict. Which means the bears are killed. 🐻 :(
“God created everything for billionaires to profit from!” Duh!
Same comments I got when I said I was planting apple trees in my front yard. Those are for the public, the ones in my back yard are for me.
Everyone in my street is selling their apples on the street. Every house has a little basket and a sign “1 kilo 1 euro” or something like that. Some are even giving them away for free. I gave mine away in bulk, so I haven’t got anything to pu in the street.
The annoying thing about fruit trees is that the fruits are only good for picking for like 1-2 weeks of the whole year. If you don’t pick them during those 2 weeks, they rot and spoil. That’s why the whole street tries to sell them pretty much at the same time, because you can’t pick fruit like a basket at the time. You have to pick the whole tree during those 2 weeks.
It depends on the tree, I think, doesn’t it? I have a fig tree and the figs are great for about 45 seconds in July. Essentially unfit for human consumption any other time!
Mine is in August. Figs supposedly have two harvests a year, but I must have blinked during the other one.
it’s pretty standard here to have a basket outside your fence where you dump the fallen fruit that looks nice, most people don’t even want the fruit from their trees in the first place so they’re just glad to have some of it magically disappear.
And then you have old ladies come by to take all the fruit for themselves saying “It’s public property bitch!!”
Great when are we eating the pie? I’ll bring ice cream
Clearly you’ve never heard about the “rhubarb lady”. Conan even did a sketch about it lol
I put on a vest and plant clones of apple trees in public parks
I put on my robe and wizard hat…
I flip my hair back and forth
We need to re-think our relationship with property.
I think it’s fine, we don’t want people eating when they haven’t served us first. If we own the country, I see no reason to tolerate loose people freeloading off it’s bounty when we don’t have to.
So, in your eyes, one’s worth is directly tied to whether or not you have a job?
In my city, olive trees thrive like mad. I could probably start a business selling a few tons of brined and jarred olives a year entirely on free produce.
Lemons, too. I could go for a 15 minute walk in any random neighbourhood and come back with 10 pounds of lemons.
I live in Canberra, Australia and we also have an excellent climate for olives and lemons. Apples and practically all citrus also do well and plums grow like topsi
Deep inland, 600m elevation
Lemon stealing whore.
Athens?
Shelbyville?
Gross, no. A different Mediterranean climate nowhere near the Mediterranean.
