The following ad on Craig’s list caught my attention this morning because it had a word that I had never heard before.
gleaning for 8mth unemployed family (central VA)
Have any fruit trees that you no longer collect the fruit or perhaps don’t have the time or health to do the picking? I am a Christian Dad that has been unemployed for 8 months now and am looking to store/preserve food for the future. If you have leftovers in your gardens or orchards I will be glad to pick for free or work out a labor barter agreement such as picking shares, mowing your lawn, cleaning gutters, etc.
Being an avid reader and writer, my vocabulary is pretty good, but I had never heard of gleaning before and I had to look the word up in the dictionary. Gleaning means to gather grain or other produce left by reapers. Once I had read the ad, it was pretty obvious what the man was advertising for but my google search for gleaning turned up some other interesting information.
There are several networks both secular and non secular who provide gleaning. These groups work with farmers to provide volunteers to go out to farms and harvest unmarketable fruits and vegetables. They then provide these leftovers to food banks and pantries. Often these gleanings are the only fresh fruits and vegetables that they can get to give to needy and hungry families.
The ad on Craig’s list was a surprise and it truly left me wondering how successful it would be and whether we would see more ads like this in the coming months. I don’t know if it’s a unique idea but it certainly sparked my curiosity. If the garden had done better this year, I would have been willing to let him have some of the excess .
If you would like to learn more about gleaning, there is the Mid Atlantic Gleaning Network, and the Society of St Andrew. There are several articles about gleaning including this one from the News Record Gleaning: Helps Hungry, Stops Waste and Petric’s memory of gleaning potatoes during the depression.
Gleaning is also a mandate from the bible Deuteronomy 24:19:
When you reap your harvest in your field and forget a sheaf in the field, you shall not go back to get it; it shall be left for the alien, the orphan, and the widow, so that the LORD your God may bless you in all your undertakings
In our rural community, it is common to share your excess produce with families who might need it. It’s a small town and everyone pretty much knows which families are having hard times and which are not. The extra cucumbers, tomatoes, squash, corn and other vegetables are often given away.
If you garden, what do you do with the extra fruits and vegetables? Have you ever participated in a gleaning?
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Tags: gardening
Very intriguing! It would never have occurred to me to think of gleaning in anything other than an ancient sense. I think it’s a great way to help people out, and a fabulous idea for preventing waste!
I’ve never heard of gleaning before either. Makes me want to start a garden at my house just for the excess to share in that regard.
Yes I’ve gleaned. Apples, berries, beans, potatoes.
And I’ve made it known I will gladly accept extras from other’s gardens or fishing/hunting/clamming trips
And will cut/wrap meat for a share plus the bones.
My extra from the garden goes first to family and friends. Then extras over that go to work, or to the food bank if it is something they will accept.
There are several networks both secular and non secular who provide gleaning.
I’ve heard of it (it’s popular in cities for freegans) but I hadn’t realized it had become more common place.
This is starting to remind me of the Great Depression…not good.
Gleaning has been around a long time and is still done all over the U.S. mainly by those who keep the OT statutes and ordinances. We don’t have a garden this year but when we do have one, we leave parts of it unpicked for those who want to share in the bounty. It’s a practical and nice thing to do. It might gain in popularity because of the economy but I don’t see it as a harbinger of bad things coming, mainly because it’s been going on a long time.