EcoLocalizer

If you’re looking for a challenge, try growing a productive vegetable garden in Florida’s superheated summers. I’ve worked toward that goal every day for the past three months and have only a few successes to show for it: six sturdy sunflowers, one infant pumpkin and a spreading mass of strawberries in which the slugs beat me to the fruits nine times out of ten. On the other hand, daily explorations of my wooded backyard have revealed wild foods galore that grow without an ounce of effort on my part: huckleberries, wild blackberries, even Southern crabapples.

So I was happy to discover that other Floridians have reached the same conclusion I have: that it makes sense, in as difficult a climate as ours, to emphasize foods from native plants, especially tree crops.

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That’s the focus of the Gainesville-based Edible Plant Project (EPP), a non-profit, volunteer-run group that’s looking to “promote edible landscaping and local food abundance in North Central Florida.” The group, which rightfully calls tree crops “wonders of nature” that can yield abundant food for decades, maintains a nursery of fruit and nut trees for people to plant in the community. The trees — everything from mulberry, fig and loquat to pear, pecan and persimmon — are sold at a reasonable price: “just enough to cover our expenses.”

The group is also working to establish a seed bank of non-hybrid vegetables that are ideally adapted to local growing conditions (I’ll be looking for some of those soon to replace the sad crops currently in my garden!). And its Website is building up a collection of unique, local-food-focused recipes, including amaranth flour pancakes, Okinawa spinach with rice and mango, and pindo palm sorbets. (I didn’t even know pindo palm fruits were edible till I checked out the recipes page — guess who’ll be trying homemade sorbet soon? Thanks EPP!)

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