This article is published in collaboration with L.A. Public Press, an independent, non-profit newsroom that publishes news in support of a healthier Los Angeles.
The backyard fruit tree is ubiquitous across Southern California. Oranges, lemons, avocados, kumquats, loquats, pomegranates — chances are you or someone you know has at least one of these growing in their yard right now and have happily (or desperately) shared harvests with friends, family, and colleagues.
But with so much wildfire ash and smoke flung across the LA Basin that the LA County public health officials temporarily prohibited the use of leaf blowers, home gardeners may be wondering: Can I eat my homegrown produce?
The short answer is yes—with precautions.
“People had the exact same question in the North Bay in 2017,” said Julia Van Soelen Kim, food systems advisor for the UC Cooperative Extension in Marin County. That year’s Tubbs Fire became California’s most destructive at the time. “It was the first really big urban fire with thousands of structures that were destroyed, so that, in its very nature, is different from a typical wildland forest fire,” she said.