Giving "ornamental" Citrus Fruit a Second Life

­In Coachella Valley over 130 golf courses and many more residential communities use citrus trees as ornamental landscaping, creating an “accidental” crop of at least 2 million pounds of tangerines, oranges, lemons and grapefruit each and every year – without a good plan to harvest it. In the past, country clubs and private communities have had to pay large dumping fees, in addition to the cost of labor just to throw away most of this precious source of Vitamin C.

What is Citrus Rescue? The goal of the Citrus Rescue Program is to “rescue” this ornamental fruit and distribute it, free of charge to the more than 60 local agencies that provide food and services to those in need throughout the valley. Some of the people that benefit from this source of fruit range from young children in after school programs to low-income seniors valley wide.

All rescued citrus is brought back to the Hidden Harvest warehouse in Coachella where our hard working volunteers sort and pack it for distribution to over 70 local agencies that provide food and services to those in need throughout the valley. In 2009 we collected and delivered, free of charge, over 215,000 pounds of fresh, local citrus fruit to our client agencies.

Hidden Harvest has two primary missions: One is to provide a healthy source of food to communities of people who are hungry and statistically have extremely high rates of diabetes and obesity, due to poor diet. The other is to employ low income farm workers to harvest produce, providing $10 an hour payment for their hard work. The Citrus Rescue Program is one initiative to help achieve both missions.

Citrus Drop-Off Locations Palm Springs City Maintenance Yard, 425 N. Civic Drive – 760-323-8214 Cathedral City City Hall, 68-700 Avenida Lalo Guerrero – 760-770-0340 Rancho Mirage City Hall, 69-825 Hwy. 111 – 760-324-4511 Palm Desert Palm Desert Visitor Center, 73-567 Hwy. 111 – 760-346-0611 Indian Wells City Hall, 44-950 El Dorado Dr. – 760-346-2489 La Quinta La Quinta Library parking lot – 78-275 Calle Tampico 760-777-7120

Thank you for your support!