with Hank and Vera Jones
Location: Golden Triangle
Meeting Spot: Ottawa City Hall, Lisgar Street entrance
Tour Details:
Join us on a walking tours in the Somerset Ward and Capital Ward to discover and learn about edible treenuts already growing across the city. Late summer is the perfect time for identifying these trees with the nuts close to ripening and easy to see. Plan for a return visit at harvest time.
See their 2006 Tour.
Tour Guide Bios:
Hank is President of Cobjon Nutculture Services and Past Chair of ECSONG. He founded Cobjon in 1978 and was a founding member of ECSONG in 1979. He has worked to create a profitable edible nut production industry across the Eastern Ontario region ever since. He foresees within a few years, an industry worth tens of millions a year built in part around many local producers scattered across the region. He also foresees an industry sector built on nut crops and nutwoods that are grown within the municipalities as a part of their urban forest what he calls their 'urban nutculture agroforest'. These trees offer all the environmental benefits of other trees while also earning money from their crops. These monies could be used to offset the cost to taxpayers of the urban forest, making it tax revenue neutral, whilst encouraging the planting of ever more trees.
Vera has served as both Secretary and Treasurer for the Eastern Chapter Society of Ontario Nut Growers (ECSONG) on separate occasions. She is developing the Allbirch Pollinator Garden for its ecological benefits to our damaged pollinator populations. Vera is working to persuade the city to change its property standards by-law to allow urban forests, edible landscapes and meadows within the urban environment.
Hank and Vera are working to launch an annual Red Oak Forest Festival, celebrating our unique red oak forest, on the Torbolton Peninsula.
Treenut growing or Nut harvesting Resources provided by Hank and Vera:
- 'Canada Nutist' Facebook page
- Background info on how to prepare nuts and great recipes
- Profile on Endangered Butternut Trees
- Yahoo discussion group on Acorns (international)
- Handout from Walking Tour - list of trees and their locations in Centretown
