Buy a lot or two to set up as public gardening space for food.
Also consider adding some fruit and nut trees elsewhere. As well as bushes for berries and other fruits.
Need some protection for the gardens, and a bit of training on how to handle some of the nuts (and some of the fruits for that matter).
I used live a few blocks from where some oak trees were planted along the sidewalk, and all those acorns getting swept into the street or walked on made me sad.
Chestnuts are probably at least as hard to process for edibility as acorns, thus the classes bit..
Some SCA folk had noted trees in their neighborhood or those of friends where fruit or nuts were going to waste. They went around and asked in advance if they could harvest them.
In some cases the owner/renter was happy to just get the stuff *gone* so they didn't have to deal with it. Others wanted a share of the harvest. And I'm sure some declined.
But older neighborhoods will have *lots* of neglected trees and bushes of that sort (as well as things like nightshade that really need too be replaced with something safer!)
Add in new trees/bushes where there aren't any (or where the ones that were there have died of neglect or been vandalized to death). For the trees some discreet soup help to get them to bear sooner than normal (or help moving grown trees) would likely be worth the effort.
Also, regarding the sky rats. Not only will breeders be interested, but wildlife biologists will be too. The breeders may pay more, but the biologists can probably pay some folks enough to be useful to observe and take notes. and teaching kids to do that will give them skills that are useful for other things.
Just pictured the " sky rat watchers club" at a local school. Or the now trained observers going on to observer things for other scientists. :-)
Oh yeah, sky rats are going to lead to all sorts of fun as folks find out that stuff that'll keep birds and squirrels out of your attic aren't so good against sky rats.
Wonder what the local hawks make of them? I was gonna suggest flying mice, but they'd be rather likely to serve as hawksnacks before their population built much.
Re: Well ...
Also consider adding some fruit and nut trees elsewhere. As well as bushes for berries and other fruits.
Need some protection for the gardens, and a bit of training on how to handle some of the nuts (and some of the fruits for that matter).
I used live a few blocks from where some oak trees were planted along the sidewalk, and all those acorns getting swept into the street or walked on made me sad.
Chestnuts are probably at least as hard to process for edibility as acorns, thus the classes bit..
Some SCA folk had noted trees in their neighborhood or those of friends where fruit or nuts were going to waste. They went around and asked in advance if they could harvest them.
In some cases the owner/renter was happy to just get the stuff *gone* so they didn't have to deal with it. Others wanted a share of the harvest. And I'm sure some declined.
But older neighborhoods will have *lots* of neglected trees and bushes of that sort (as well as things like nightshade that really need too be replaced with something safer!)
Add in new trees/bushes where there aren't any (or where the ones that were there have died of neglect or been vandalized to death). For the trees some discreet soup help to get them to bear sooner than normal (or help moving grown trees) would likely be worth the effort.
Also, regarding the sky rats. Not only will breeders be interested, but wildlife biologists will be too. The breeders may pay more, but the biologists can probably pay some folks enough to be useful to observe and take notes. and teaching kids to do that will give them skills that are useful for other things.
Just pictured the " sky rat watchers club" at a local school. Or the now trained observers going on to observer things for other scientists. :-)
Oh yeah, sky rats are going to lead to all sorts of fun as folks find out that stuff that'll keep birds and squirrels out of your attic aren't so good against sky rats.
Wonder what the local hawks make of them? I was gonna suggest flying mice, but they'd be rather likely to serve as hawksnacks before their population built much.