Have you heard of urban foraging? According to this guy from the Pop Up Patch in Melbourne, it’s completely legal to pick fruit off of your neighbours’ trees, if it is hanging over the fence. Take a look.
Laneway Foraging from The Little Veggie Patch Co on Vimeo.
I’m not sure if I could do this. I’ll admit it’s kind of cool in a nanna, Depression-era, creative thrift kind of way. But in my head, I’m not sure if I could shake off the ‘scabby’ taint of stealing other people’s harvests.
In an effort to convince myself to be all sustainable and healthy, I took a wander through the back lanes of my neighbourhood to see what might be ripe for the picking. It’s fairly late in the season but I still found some lemons, persimmons, olives, chokoes and cumquats that were mostly good to go, and some grapes that had only just finished. Oh and a lorikeet that was most put out by the intrusion. Not bad huh?
How about you? Would you / do you go urban foraging?
I suspect that our neighbourhood has decided urban foraging is not the done thing. We deliberately put our vegie garden out the front as lots of people walk by our house on the way to the beach and it was our hope that we could share our abundant crop of lettuces and zucchinis with our neighbours. Alas, no-one has helped themselves as yet. In fact, we have had neighbours warn us that if we left our huge zucchinis any longer, someone would be sure to steal them! I’m thinking I might have to make a “Help Yourself” sign to put in the garden each time that we have surplus produce, although another neighbour told me that her daughter did this for her massive rosemary plant so that people could help themselves to sprigs as needed and came out one morning to find that someone had dug up the entire bush! Perhaps there is room for an urban foraging etiquette guide. Love the post and video by the way
xxx
You guys are so cute. I wish I lived nearby! Perhaps a basket of already-harvested surplus with a “help yourself” sign?
I always think that if the fruit one wishes to pick is hanging over the fence of a laneway, road, or footpath – then the old rule applies that it belongs to everyone. If however, it is inside the gate it is off limits unless otherwise stated. Of course people could be brave and go knock on the door of the owner and who knows, a new friendship could be made and you could go home with an ample supply.