Hi everybody, I am so thrilled to announce my recent purchase of the "Los Angeles Fig Forest.com" domain. I wanted this for as long as I can remember...
If anybody has constructive suggestion please be free..., I could use help to build a beautiful website so everybody can enjoy and be proud of.

Next step: To find a suitable land fit for the name.

Where will this take me and us is still undecided but it sure will be fun.

Once I was given a site as a b'day gift.  it was fun discovering how it worked and such, but it wore off and I got tired of it. Nor I was willing to pay the fee after the 2 year expired.  I wish you luck, it can be fun, but also draining. you will find less and less time to spend with the kids and figs...

Aaron-

Congratulations!  Best of luck with your endeavors.


Frank

Nifty!  Waiting to see your first content!

Aaron,
Just that name conjures amazing images...can't wait to see how this unfurls over the years.

thanks everybody...

@Grasa, I totally see how it may develop into a burden, this is clearly not a One Man Job. 

@Greg, I know right? I'm the only one who will have this domain name.
Now I need the space to creat the real forest for public to visit and be educated , taste the fruit of Heavens and learn how beneficial the Figs can be to our health.

SO much to plan and dream about..:)

I already have few Garden club groups wanting to volunteer to develop the plans and taking from virtual to real world.

I have also initiated the communication with City of Glendale Plan Development Dept...They are taking the matter into National Park Dept. to see what they can do about it.

Nice! Congrats!
Maybe there is some land available higher up in the hills? I think the lower populated area would be too expensive. 

Hi Aaron4usa,
When choosing land, do not forget access to water - for free or for cheap !
Good luck !

[QUOTE=jdsfrance]Hi Aaron4usa,
When choosing land, do not forget access to water - for free or for cheap !
Good luck ![/QUOTE]

Important, but tough to find in California :<(

Congratulations Aaron. We hope to see lots and lots of pictures in the future.

Good luck with the whole thing!  How many acres are you thinking about?

Congrats and best wishes, Aaron!

@igor, thanks. Maybe you can pitch in (you do belong to LA district) ... ;)

@jd, There are several neglected projects by developers that have already had water and power and sewage ...I am praying for something like that. Otherwise, Hillsides are next preference, hopefully facing South West.

@Sas, there definitely will be pictorial documentation of every move towards development...Did you get your package yet?

@Bob, they asked me that question and my answer was Bigger Better, after all, we are in US, right? LOL
 
thanks Harvey

Congratulations Aaron.
Good luck!

Francisco

Thank you Francisco :)

Wait till you go bonkers and start collecting domains like they're figs.

It starts with one, and before you know it you've got 2 dozen.

nuh, this is the only domain I need and always wanted.

Edit: Although... World Domination Idea sounds very tempting...hm...(scratching my head))

Good luck with your endeavors Aaron. It'll be wonderful to see your progress towards your goal.

Grats.  Will be looking forward to seeing it develop.

Aaron - Waiting. A tree like this one, will always have a place in my humble collection. Thank You.

Aaron, I bought the land last year and still have to plant some new trees. It is one hour away from my home and I already consider it too far.
Unless you have irrigation set up nothing will happen. I lost a whole bunch of trees by not irrigating. I left them to mother nature.
Now, I plan to fix the well and run a line before I do anything else. It's just a matter of finding the time and energy. Best of Luck...

 

I'm happy for you, Aaron. I think you have the drive and passion to get it done. A beautiful thing.

You should register your name as a .ORG  as well.

You will eventually discover the need to become
a non profit organization to realize your potential dream.

What you seek to accomplish cannot be done as a private enterprise
for numerous reasons,
unless you happen to have a sponsor/benefactor with extremely deep pockets
to start and maintain the project yearly.

@Sas, good point, The strategic timing of planting would help the survival, although I agree, without irrigation there is little power in one's hands to support life.

Pat,
Sharon,
Gary thanks for the kind words.

The Real Forest project is a long term and slow developing, in nature, project that has to be carefully planned and executed with help of many professionals and experienced personnel.
But the Virtual Forest with it's website can be started right away, in fact I have started planning the content and what would be the purpose of it for reader.

BTW, any Ideas and Help from volunteer fellow forum members would be appreciated.

Not sure if you're a web person but the easiest way to go is to install a wordpress site, which give you a backend that's very easy to edit without having to know html.  My 2 cents.  And starting a non-profit is a good idea.  Our 22 year old permaculture demonstration is part of a non-profit and I like how the whole thing fits together, tho I don't spend my time generating donations or anything for that particular project.

Thank you Miekal, I purchased a web creator service for 2 years also and it's pretty easy to create the site with it's help. The Non-Profit is the way it will be. It's about helping people understand the Fig and bring them closer to nature , and a lot more that I can't bring up yet. I just need to decide how to organize the website before it's launching.

Aaron, good Luck Bud! I bet you do a great Job on this! There can never be enough Fig websites!!

Hey Aaron,

I've been building websites professionally for as long as there have been websites to build. I cannot offer my services - neither paid nor volunteer; I get my fill of code at work every day. However, please feel free to hit me up if you need any technical advice. I don't want to do any work, but I'd be happy to point you in the right direction.

If only you had called it SoCalFigForest.com... I would have felt more included ;(

Congrats Aaron and good luck,,,,,,, Ong Indonesia

Jack is right, you should consider the .org version as well unless you plan for this to be a private project indefinitely.

I own 7 domains for myself and another 2 for non-profits I'm members of.  I had 1 domain I decided to let go that I wish I didn't.  It's not as much of an impulsive thing as collecting figs but owning domains can be valuable.

I definitely want the Non-Profit concept.  So, the Non-Profit can't be .com ?
 
Frank, Ong thank you...

Paul, Alan thanks for the offer... I can surely use all the free help I can get.

I have never built a site but this one is enabling me to type all I want and embed pictures, clips and voice recordings and graphics.

Yes, a non-profit can use .com but the domain extension (.com) does represent "company" compared .org for organization, etc.

There is a benefit to owning both as someone can come in and register the other with the expressed intent to cause confusion or attract visitors that had intended to visit your site.

well, should I reserve the .org and .net ? because they are holding them for me until I decide...

something to think about for sure...

And Alan, ...about SoCal V's Los Angeles...?  I know what I want :)  sorry

Congratulations Aaron. And good luck to you too. Norhayati

[QUOTE=Aaron4USA]I definitely want the Non-Profit concept.  [/QUOTE]

Not for Profit status requires  considerable effort and expense to
establish and maintain.
Just can't declare yourself non profit,
need to apply with the IRS for this.

Not for profit status process
will make building a website look like a walk in the park,
or fig forest in this case.

IRS Form 1023 - Not for profit application,
here is the link http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/f1023.pdf
Need to form a corporation before applying for NP status.

Aaron, if you haven't done so, watch The Fruit Hunters movie.  A group in part of the movie tried putting together a food forest in LA and thought they had a deal together but it just didn't work out.  You might be able to hook up with some of them and get some ideas.

wow, really? who are these people Harvey?

Space vs Interest

Reality is, in many urban and highly populated areas,
there is insufficient space available for any type of orchards,
they just require too much room, even small ones.

Even if space is available, its hard for municipalities to
dedicate the acreage for a project that would still be considered "special interest"
due to the limited amount of the population it would serve.
Using the similar acreage for a park or recreation center
would serve a much higher percentage of the public,
thus the added difficulty is securing land for projects like these.
Funding then becomes the next headache/nightmare to deal with,
then there is always liability issues and the lawyers, fun fun fun.

Private entities at times will lend land they are not using for
these types of projects, but will only do so on a year to year,
or several year basis.  Most are unwilling to commit to the decade(s)
that orchards require.

I'm in the NY area, and the community or government sponsored farms
are mostly measured in fractions of an acre.
The handful of larger farms exist because of their historical nature.

Finding space that is easily accessible by the public is the largest problem in most cases.

Funding is the next major hurdle,
as accomplishing any type of farming activity with government involvement/oversight,
becomes very expensive and usually highly inefficient in most cases.
In the NY area, budgets for these types of farms are currently running $50,000-75,000 per HALF ACRE a  YEAR,
and they usually get free farm equipment and utilities (water/power).   
Imagine the costs on something 4-10 acres in size.

The other reality is on a farm,
its hard to accomplish what needs to be done with volunteers.
The IDEA of farming is actually very far from the reality of farming,
its hard, dirty, hot and back breaking work.
So for this reason, the output from volunteers is very low.
If you have 10 hours of farm labor that needs to be accomplished,
like weeding, harvesting, etc,  then you will need 70-100 hours of volunteer labor
to accomplish those 10 hours of labor.
Attracting and organizing this labor take time and effort as well.

The reality is, one experienced farm hand in one day will accomplish the
work of 10 volunteers and the farm manager would do in a day.
Day laborer costs $100-120 a day,
farm manager, costs to organize volunteers and other associated costs
far exceed this number.
Next, is the reality that you are dealing with mother nature,
and the rule is EVERY DAY IS DIFFERENT.
You can schedule projects, organize volunteers all you want,
have plantings scheduled, etc  and the weather works against you,
which results in delays of weeks or months many times,
which equates to these project not reaching their goals usually,
and becoming very expensive along the way, when they try to correct the problems.
On a farm/orchard, work needs to be done every day, and its never 9 to 5,
certain times of the year, its 5am to 9pm.
This reality does not fit it well with volunteer labor as its main source of labor.

Even with paid labor,
its very hard to find people who are willing to do the hard physical labor required,
and their output is  minimal.

As an example there is a 2 acre gov sponsored farm in NYC,
they have a 150k budget for labor,  2 full time employees,
2 part time employees, numerous volunteers,
enough tractors and implements to handle a 500 acre farm,
and as of this week,
they have planted less than 1 acre of the farm,
just planted their tomatoes this week, (I'm picking tomatoes already)
have several hoop houses filled with plants that have aged out in their flats
and are half dead, with no backups or succession plantings started.
Less than on acre planted and another filled with weeds, we are 6 months
into the year, which means there is about 70-80k in labor invested,
less than an acre planted.
Using the equipment on site, I could plant the entire 2 acres
with 2 experienced field laborers in ONE DAY, labor cost  $250
and my hands would not even get dirty.
Last year, this farm harvested all of 8,000 pounds of vegetables
at a cost of 150k,
puts the cost of veggies at $19.00 per pound.
They "make money" by having a farmer market during the week,
in the middle of the day, where they sell the produce for $2-3 a pound.
Last year they harvested their first tomatoes for the final week of their farm stand,
this year, the tomatoes will ripen after the farm stand closes for the year.
They harvest, wash, display, sell a small portion, some is donated to food pantries,
but usually due to transportation issues for the produce,
the left over produce is thrown in the garbage.

This scenario is repeated in many different locations
when it comes to these types of entities.
I could give you example after example.

Why these type of projects with a scale of
anything larger than a few thousand square feet,
turn into expensive, complicated nightmares.

Your project can be accomplished,
it will take much determination, time and money on your part.
Be prepared for this battle and commitment in PERSONAL resources.

Also be prepared to change your vision multiple times along the way
to appease various entities that will be involved with the project.

Hi Aaron, Non profits are easy to set up. First check with the state and see what they need. Then deal with the IRS. This can take up to 6 months or more. I live in Washington state and have helped set up a few non profits. A lot of clubs are non profit, so go to the state and get their paper work and change to your needs. Worked great for me.

Good luck Rick
Lakewood WA

[QUOTE=Aaron4USA]wow, really? who are these people Harvey?[/QUOTE]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Fruit_Hunters

[QUOTE]Subjects in the film include actor Bill Pullman, who was not featured in Gollner's book. The filmmakers became aware of his interest in fruit thanks to a 2009 New York Times profile. The film follows Pullman's efforts to develop a communal orchard near his Hollywood Hills residence.[/QUOTE]

One area where I see small agricultural/nursery activities conducted in SoCal is under in easements for large electrical towers where construction is not possible.  Some are used for parkways but not all locations are suitable for those purposes.

What if the "forest" is not a single place? Create a website integrated with Google Maps and create a map of fig trees within Los Angeles County. Users can upload coordinates of fig trees and attach photos, description, tree history, tasting notes, youtube links, etc. You can do all of that mostly for free with Google APIs. If it takes off, make a phone app to go with it so that you can geo-tag, photograph and upload to website out in the field fig hunting.

@Norhayati, thankg for the good luck wishes...I'm going to need a lot of that, :)

@rx2, Rick  thanks for the advice, I am on it as we speak...

Harvey, now I remember, I have seen that movie on YouTube... the fruit cutting smugglers...LOL

Alan, you have nice ideas...something to think about after setting up the non-profit.

Paul, this program is offering Google Map options, so it is easy to put the location on the map on the website.

I am even entertaining the idea of the concept...Los Angeles IS a Fig Forest...which is true. All those, hidden from humans, places that figs grow. It's a whole new door for adventures...I just don't want to create a problem with undisturbed pockets of peaceful nature here and there. Or exposing locations of unusual fig trees...not fair.

Well how about that!  I was off forum for awhile and I missed hearing about The LA Fig Forest project.  Aaron I think you can do this!  Of course its necessary to assess the risks but if the fear of failure is paralyzing, nothing would ever be done.   "Nothing ventured, nothing gained"   I hope this project will have great success.  I think the timing is right for it  These type projects are the future. 
 
Nonprofit vs Not For Profit??
                       .                         

Soni, 

1. "Los Angeles Fig Forest" is planned to be a Non-Profit project, it is going to be a research base project.

2. "Los Angeles Fig Forest.com" is planned to be a virtual version of the real forest.
It will provide tons of information and updates to what's happening in the forest, where on the other hand can have a part that has marketing department just to help the entire project to be self sustaining.
Some forum members have been giving great ideas that are very helpful during the organizing process and some have even come forward volunteering to contribute time of their expertise.
Thank you all :)

I did it...I don't know where it's going to lead me/us with it but...I published it, now the world will see and read.
It's not near to be complete and a lot of pages will be held back until they are verified and proof-read etc...But I wanted to Publish it today because...it's a special year. A lot happened this year folks, including regrouping and reorganizing and I graduated from my school...and the Name/Synonyms list is...so much done with and that has to be proof-read too before I include in the website...so...(i think I am getting drunk?) 
Anyway...here's I'll release it and let it slowly mature like a nice barrel of Merlot.
Feel free to write me suggestions and ideas of improvements in future...

Cheesr and Happy New Year to all, I love you all and thank you for the wonderful advises and wisdom a lot of you gave to keep me going in life.

God Bless. :)

http://www.losangelesfigforest.com/about.html

or

WWW.LosAngelesFigForest.com

Hahaha, drinking and internet don't mix son... Good stuff Aaron!!!

Aaron - Did you get a piece of land for your forest?

Hi Danny, 

No, not yet, it's in process though.

The website is the Virtual Version of it... later they will merge to offer the updates of the real forest to readers.