In 2002 Jack London State Historic Park acquired approximately 600 acres of land from the Sonoma Developmental Center State Hospital. This land included a historic orchard, planted primarily between the years of 1908-1912. In 2007, California Department of Parks and Recreation and the National Park Service partnered on an assessment of the orchard and determined it to be a valuable Historic and Cultural Landscape and that it should be stabilized for future generations to experience.
Soon after Jack London Park Partners entered into an operating agreement with the Department of Parks and Recreation to manage Jack London State Historic Park, the non-profit began working in this historic orchard to stabilize the historic trees. This work consisted of clearing competing vegetation away, pruning deadwood, bracing, thinning fruit, mulching, watering and removal of harmful invasive species, and this work continues today.
Through doing this work it became apparent that an expanded project was needed as many of these historic trees had already been lost, and even the healthy trees are nearing the end of their life cycle. Jack London Park Partners developed a plan with California State Parks for a cultural restoration of the historic orchard, which began in 2017.
This new expanded plan includes replanting areas of the historic orchard grid with cuttings taken from the historic trees. These cuttings (scions) are grafted onto rootstock by a grafting expert and once ready are planted on the same grid where historic trees have disappeared. In doing this, a visitor to the orchard will not only get to see and appreciate the individual trees, some of which are over 100 years old, but will be able to experience what a pre-World War II orchard landscape would have been like. In the fall of 2017, Jack London Park Partners planted the first tree in the orchard in over 50 years—a quince seedling grown from a cutting taken from the last surviving quince tree in the historic orchard. To date more than 50 trees have been planted including quince, apple, pear, cherry and apricots.
In 2021, Jack London Park Partners began working with the non-profit Farm to Pantry, and now the fruit grown in the orchard is donated to those facing food insecurities. With the pilot of this partnership donating over 1,000 lbs of fruit to those in need, we are confident that this year even more will be donated.
For more information about this project email Jack London Park Partners Director of Operations, Eric Metz at [email protected]