David Karp (born 1958) is an active
pomologist
Pomology (from Latin , “fruit,” + ) is a branch of botany that studies fruit and its cultivation. The term fruticulture—introduced from Romance languages (all of whose incarnations of the term descend from Latin and )—is also used.
Pomol ...
, traveler and writer,
who calls himself a ''Fruit detective''.
David is the son of Harvey Karp, a businessman, whose
East Hampton home was reputed to be a palace.
He was fluent in
Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
when he graduated from high school. At 20, while majoring in
medieval art
The medieval art of the Western world covers a vast scope of time and place, over 1000 years of art in Europe, and at certain periods in Western Asia and Northern Africa. It includes major art movements and periods, national and regional art, gen ...
studies at
Wesleyan University
Wesleyan University ( ) is a Private university, private liberal arts college, liberal arts university in Middletown, Connecticut. Founded in 1831 as a Men's colleges in the United States, men's college under the auspices of the Methodist Epis ...
, he published a translation of the 6th-century Latin author
Venantius Fortunatus
Venantius Honorius Clementianus Fortunatus ( 530 600/609 AD; french: Venance Fortunat), known as Saint Venantius Fortunatus (, ), was a Latin poet and hymnographer in the Merovingian Court, and a bishop of the Early Church who has been venerate ...
.
After graduation, he started a career in risk arbitrage and option trading on
Wall Street
Wall Street is an eight-block-long street in the Financial District of Lower Manhattan in New York City. It runs between Broadway in the west to South Street and the East River in the east. The term "Wall Street" has become a metonym for t ...
, has worked for gourmet specialty store ''Citarella'' and acted as a provisioner for
Dean & DeLuca. Recovering from a serious drug addiction, he changed course and began a new career as a freelance fruit writer.
Karp moved to California in 1999.
Writings
Karp's photographs and writings appear in his weekly column, Market Watch, at the ''
Los Angeles Times
The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the Un ...
'', and he has written articles for ''
The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'', ''
The Wall Street Journal
''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...
'', ''
Gourmet
Gourmet (, ) is a cultural idea associated with the culinary arts of fine food and drink, or haute cuisine, which is characterized by refined, even elaborate preparations and presentations of aesthetically balanced meals of several contrasting, of ...
'', ''
Smithsonian'', ''
Sunset
Sunset, also known as sundown, is the daily disappearance of the Sun below the horizon due to Earth's rotation. As viewed from everywhere on Earth (except the North and South poles), the equinox Sun sets due west at the moment of both the spring ...
'', ''
Star-Ledger'' and ''
Saveur
''Saveur'' is an online gourmet, food, wine, and travel magazine that publishes essays about various world cuisines. The publication was co-founded by Dorothy Kalins, Michael Grossman, Christopher Hirsheimer, and Colman Andrews, who was also the ...
'' publications.
He has been a guest on the Saturday morning food show on radio station
KCRW
KCRW (89.9 MHz FM) is a National Public Radio member station broadcasting from the campus of Santa Monica College in Santa Monica, California, where the station is licensed. KCRW airs original news and music programming in addition to programm ...
.
When the threat of
citrus greening
Citrus greening disease (; or HLB) is a disease of citrus caused by a vector-transmitted pathogen. The causative agents are motile bacteria, ''Liberibacter'' spp. The disease is vectored and transmitted by the Asian citrus psyllid, ''Diaphorina ...
first appeared in the U.S., Karp wrote in the ''New York Times'' to alert the public of the disease's risks.
Projects
Citrus Documentation at CVC
Karp is an associate in the
Agricultural Experiment Station at the University of California, Riverside, working to photograph and document the more than 1,000 varieties grown at the
Citrus Variety Collection of the University of California. Displayed on the CVC website], these photos are accessible to researchers throughout the world.
Citrus germplasm in China
He helped co-found the Chinese Citrus Germplasm Repository in
Jiangshui (about 50 miles from
Kunming
Kunming (; ), also known as Yunnan-Fu, is the capital and largest city of Yunnan province, China. It is the political, economic, communications and cultural centre of the province as well as the seat of the provincial government. The headquar ...
), province of
Yunnan
Yunnan , () is a landlocked Provinces of China, province in Southwest China, the southwest of the People's Republic of China. The province spans approximately and has a population of 48.3 million (as of 2018). The capital of the province is ...
.
Bunyard Orchard
David Karp and Andy Mariani are co-founders of the Bunyard Orchard of
heirloom
In popular usage, an heirloom is something that has been passed down for generations through family members. Examples are a Family Bible, antiques, weapons or jewellery.
The term originated with the historical principle of an heirloom in ...
stone fruit
In botany, a drupe (or stone fruit) is an indehiscent fruit in which an outer fleshy part (exocarp, or skin, and mesocarp, or flesh) surrounds a single shell (the ''pit'', ''stone'', or ''pyrena'') of hardened endocarp with a seed (''kernel'') ...
in
Morgan Hill, California
Morgan Hill is a city in Santa Clara County, California, at the southern tip of Silicon Valley, in the San Francisco Bay Area. Morgan Hill is an affluent residential community, the seat of several high-tech companies, and a dining, entertainmen ...
.
Unforbidden Fruit
Karp became involved as a researcher in a joint project between the
University of California, Riverside
The University of California, Riverside (UCR or UC Riverside) is a public land-grant research university in Riverside, California. It is one of the ten campuses of the University of California system. The main campus sits on in a suburban distr ...
and the
USDA
The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) is the federal executive department responsible for developing and executing federal laws related to farming, forestry, rural economic development, and food. It aims to meet the needs of com ...
to prevent smuggling of fruit into California that may harbor insects that could threaten the state’s fruit industry. The project —Unforbidden Fruits: Preventing Citrus Smuggling by Introducing Varieties Culturally Significant to Ethnic Communities—focuses on making disease-free
germplasm
Germplasm are living genetic resources such as seeds or tissues that are maintained for the purpose of animal and plant breeding, preservation, and other research uses. These resources may take the form of seed collections stored in seed banks, tr ...
of citrus and non-citrus fruit available to Californian nurseries and tree farmers, to replace the illicit demand.
![Tejocotes2](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/25/Tejocotes2.jpg)
A non-citrus fruit that the project has targeted is ''"
tejocote
''Crataegus mexicana'' is a species of hawthorn known by the common names , , and Mexican hawthorn. It is native to the mountains of Mexico and parts of Guatemala, and has been introduced in the Andes. The fruit of this species is one of the mos ...
"'' (''
Crataegus mexicana
''Crataegus mexicana'' is a species of hawthorn known by the common names , , and Mexican hawthorn. It is native to the mountains of Mexico and parts of Guatemala, and has been introduced in the Andes. The fruit of this species is one of the m ...
'', sometimes called ''Crataegus pubescens''), a fruit that is grown in the highlands of
Mexico
Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...
. Because it was not being grown in the U.S., it was often smuggled into the country and sold to Mexicans who wanted to use it to serve the traditional fruit drink called ''
ponche
The term punch refers to a wide assortment of drinks, both non-alcoholic and alcoholic, generally containing fruits or fruit juice. The drink was introduced from the Indian subcontinent to England by employees of the East India Company in th ...
'' at Christmastime. Now that ''tejocote'' is being grown legally in California, much of the smuggling into the country has dropped off.
RosBREED
Karp is a member of the "extension advisory panel" for RosBREED, an organization dedicated to improving
rosaceae
Rosaceae (), the rose family, is a medium-sized family of flowering plants that includes 4,828 known species in 91 genera.
The name is derived from the type genus ''Rosa''. Among the most species-rich genera are ''Alchemilla'' (270), ''Sorbus ...
crops through marker assisted crossbreeding.
Fruits of interest
Mangosteen
Karp has written several articles on the availability of the
mangosteen
Mangosteen (''Garcinia mangostana''), also known as the purple mangosteen, is a tropical evergreen tree with edible fruit native to tropical lands surrounding the Indian Ocean. Its origin is uncertain due to widespread prehistoric cultivation. ...
in the United States, due to fears they harbor the Asian
fruit fly. He wrote articles in the ''New York Times'' announcing the renewed U.S. law on July 23, 2007, when
irradiated
Irradiation is the process by which an object is exposed to radiation. The exposure can originate from various sources, including natural sources. Most frequently the term refers to ionizing radiation, and to a level of radiation that will serve ...
imports from
Thailand
Thailand ( ), historically known as Siam () and officially the Kingdom of Thailand, is a country in Southeast Asia, located at the centre of the Indochinese Peninsula, spanning , with a population of almost 70 million. The country is bo ...
were allowed upon
USDA
The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) is the federal executive department responsible for developing and executing federal laws related to farming, forestry, rural economic development, and food. It aims to meet the needs of com ...
approval, and one following its trade at the local markets.
Greengage plum
David believes the
greengage plum
The greengages are a group of cultivars of the common European plum. The first true greengage came from a green-fruited wild plum ( fa , گوجهسبز, Gowjehsabz) which originated in Iran (Persia). Greengages are grown in temperate areas an ...
is the most delicious fruit on the world,
and traveled to
Moissac
Moissac () is a commune in the Tarn-et-Garonne department in the Occitanie region in southern France. The town is situated at the confluence of the rivers Garonne and Tarn at the Canal de Garonne. Route nationale N113 was constructed through the ...
, France (its primary center of cultivation), to investigate it.
References
![greengages](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/20/Greengages.jpg)
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Karp, David
1958 births
American male writers
Living people
Pomologists
Wesleyan University alumni