Kathy and David Faith pick from a full ripe orange tree as part of South County Outreach home fruit-picking program, organized by Kathy. (Don Leach / Staff Photographer)
Orange County is named for the citrus groves that once filled the county. The bounty of Valencia oranges, Meyer lemons and limes can still be found in suburban backyards today. But plentiful harvests sometimes go to waste, which didn’t sit right with Fountain Valley resident Kathy Faith.
“I would see the fruit on trees,” said Faith, “and the fruit was always on the trees.”
Faith has been volunteering with South County Outreach, an organization dedicated to preventing hunger and homelessness, for about two years. South County Outreach has a food program in Irvine that distributes 700,000 pounds of food to more than 6,000 residents annually. Its food market is more like a grocery store than a typical pantry, which gives the families a sense of dignity as they “shop” the free store once a month.
A ripe orange in the backyard of Fountain Valley homeowner Earle Davis, ready to be picked for South County Outreach. (Don Leach / Staff Photographer)
“For perishable stuff, we have volunteers like myself that pass them out,” said Faith. “So I do the produce.”
How much produce Faith is able to pass out to each family is dependent on how much food has been donated.
“If I’ve got boxes of bananas or boxes of oranges, I will give them a bag and they can take what they want,” said Faith. “But if there are not a lot of provisions, and you are a family of five, maybe it is one potato a person. And those are really heart-breaking days.”
Faith was motivated by those days to find a way to get more produce for the families she was serving. So she turned to her community and offered to pick any overloaded trees if she could take the produce as a donation for South County Outreach.
“I just posted on Fountain Valley Community Forum and Huntington Beach Community Forum,” said Faith, “and people started responding.”
When she began her harvesting earlier this year, she kept track of how many pounds she picked.
“At one point when I was keeping tabs, I gleaned over 3,000 pounds, but I know it is more than that now.”
Kathy and David Faith pick a full ripe orange tree in the backyard of a Fountain Valley home as part of South County Outreach home fruit-picking program. (Don Leach / Staff Photographer)
On a recent Thursday morning, Faith and her husband, David, picked oranges from a medium-sized tree in Earle Davis’ backyard in Fountain Valley.
“With my boys not living at home we don’t go through enough of this fruit,” said Davis. “It is the greatest thing to be able to give back to somebody when you’ve got enough.”
Davis said the tree has been in his yard since he moved nearly 22 years ago and has always given fruit.
Although Faith started her harvesting this year, fellow South County Outreach volunteers Dave and Pat Farr have organized volunteer pickers for about five years.
Homeowner Earle Davis picks a full ripe orange tree in the backyard of his Fountain Valley home as part of South County Outreach home fruit-picking program. (Don Leach / Staff Photographer)
“We had a lot of fruit dropping to the ground that was going waste,” said Dave Farr. “We started gathering it and taking it South County Outreach.”
Besides grapefruit, oranges and lemons from his own yard, Farr also collected from other trees in his Mission Viejo neighborhood.
“Most of them were happy because they couldn’t eat all their fruit,” said Farr.
As a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Farr enlisted Mormon missionaries to help with picking.
“We have our young Mormon missionaries, and they give five hours a week of public service,” said Farr. “They will help pick the fruit in our neighborhood.”
Farr estimates they glean about 2,500 pounds per season.
“This year it was a little more because members of our church started to get involved in other areas,” said Farr.
Oranges and lemons are the most plentiful donation, though Farr said they pick limes from neighbors, too. Faith said she has harvested kumquats and loquats.
Kathy and David Faith pick a full ripe orange tree in the backyard of a Fountain Valley home as part of South County Outreach home fruit-picking program. (Don Leach / Staff Photographer)
“I am hoping people start saying, ‘Oh, I’ve got avocados,’ but those would be trickier to pick,” said Faith.
Faith separates the fruit into ripe and unripe, so the ripest produce will go out first. Anything that can wait a few days, she saves for St. Vincent de Paul Church’s food bank in Huntington Beach because the church passes out food on Mondays and Thursdays only.
Farr said as long as there are hungry residents, he is committed to serving them. “I have heard 400,000 people have some level of hunger in Orange County,” he said. “And feeding the hungry is Christian. We have an obligation to serve others.”
Faith has kept a list of whose trees she harvested from this year, with the hope of returning next season.
“God willing, if I can pick, I will do it,” said Faith. “The need doesn’t go away.”
To learn more about South County Outreach, visit sco-co.org.
