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Brian Tolle has stated that he wishes that
the Irish Hunger Memorial continues to grow as a living landscape. I
have suggested that we use the memorial to help find some of the remaining
missing apple trees from the first national collection of apple trees in
Ireland. The latest national collection is due to the work of an
American lady, Mrs. Anita Hayes, of the Irish Seed Savers now living
in Ireland. Her work is based on a 1940's Irish apple collection and
most of the lost old Irish Apple tree varieties have been found. But
there were many more species never recorded in the original collection and
I hope to be able to help Anita Hayes save a few more. I hope you
can help as well.
Hunger and Biodiversity go hand in hand,
every species lost is another species gone forever from the pharmacopoeia
and food store of this planet. Hunger and Famine are linked to
species as much to politics and greed are linked to starvation. I
cannot do much about the later but I can and do help save species from
extinction. In the 19 century some Irish immigrants to the USA, (it
is said) placed the bud of an apple tree inside a potato, and sealed it in
with a plug, when they arrived in the USA, the bud was grafted to an
American Apple and I have been told that some still survive in Boston and
New Jersey.
If you have links to the original gardens or farms planted by Irish immigrants
could you please check these gardens to see if the trees are still living.
If you find old apple trees growing or your
family has perpetuated these trees in a new garden but from original stock
please email me Sandro and send a
photograph of the tree in flower and in fruit.
Please tell your Irish Friends to look out
for Grandpa's Irish Apple tree it is of enormous value to conservation in
Ireland.
We will then contact you.
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