Coming to fruition Coming to fruition (March 26, 2003)

Photos by Stephanie Alvarez

:Since 1990, Magic volunteers assisted by wholesale nursery operators, Whole Foods Market in Palo Alto and other organizations, have salvaged thousands of surplus fruit trees and distributed them through schools and charities for planting throughout the Bay Area. Over the years, the project has rescued more than 35,000 trees and passed them along to over 17,000 children in more than 50 schools, and to almost two dozen charitable organizations. These trees now grace cities from Santa Rosa to Gonzales and Richmond to Half Moon Bay. Top, Hillary Hug and Joshua Traube take inventory on trees that will be distributed throughout schools in the Bay Area, while Chris Tyler (left) stacks them together for delivery. Above, Chris Friedel, a guest volunteer at Magic, checks the identification tags of the trees set aside for donation.. A total of 2500 fruit trees will be donated.