Johnny Tangerine Seed

When we were kids, our family had "The Golden Book Encyclopedia" as a source of reference in the home. We also had the "Art Linkletter Picture Encyclopedia For Boys and Girls". Both of them were short on photos and long on hand-drawn graphics. Everything was an artist's representation. However the quality of illustration was higher and more consistent in the Golden Book Encyclopedia.

In both, I read about Johnny Appleseed who walked about America in the pre-Revolutionary days, with a bag of apple seeds, planting apples where ever he went.

That was inspiration for me. Throughout my life, I have always returned any fruit seeds that I happened to be eating, back to the soil. Where most people would put cherry pits in the garbage, I scattered them outdoors. I did the same for any type of fruit that I thought would grown.

In the tropics, I collect the seeds of tropical fruit and scatter them around my home. I have been there a short time only, so I don't know if I have grown any trees. However, recently we bought some tangerines that are mostly seeds. They are in the bag above. Included are seeds of grapefruit, orange, mandarin and lemon. Don't be surprised if in a few years, on Paradise Island in the Bahamas, it is littered with tangerine trees.