The whole crew at last week’s end of the year lunch with our new sweatshirts!
The last CSA deliveries of the year! The final markets too! As we head to the 14th of December, 2024, we are looking forward to a break– as maybe you all are also. Maybe just now you are thinking of the freedom to cruise the wide aisles of your Safeway or Whole Foods and be tempted by the December plums or peaches from far off lands- or asparagus, tomatoes or grapes that might break the potato winter squash dark leafy green lettuce cabbage carrot monotony of a Full Belly CSA Share. For us, in the same moment, we will be looking forward to tending a quiet farm, without the tug of crops demanding attention or the chaotic hustle of crews racing to fields to fill orders- picking/bunching/digging for your table… Though you may appreciate the freedom of shopping your favorite produce aisle, (we have to admit that) we will miss you, but appreciate the quiet of this generous land.
Our crew will be out of here hours after we close for our winter break. Most will be heading off to see family. They are ready for extended time off, enduring a year of working 5½ days per week since January. Almost all have seen an increase in wages here and have benefited from overtime after working a 40 hour week. The new minimum wage and overtime rules for those who labor in our fields has been applied to all farmers, creating better wages and a level playing field across California farms. We remain intent on building a model for equity and security in housing for our crew here.
A relentless farm pace is our recipe for survival as a farm- at least in the design that we have built. We have a model based on having something to harvest or care for nearly all year. There are few breaks in our full year, full production, full employment farm plan. As we approach our break, we are a bit exhausted and ready to crawl inside and enjoy the longer darker colder nights of fall and winter.
The partners here- Andrew, Dru, Hannah, Rye, Jenna, Amon and I – will be meeting, evaluating the past and making plans for the coming year. We were able to stay one step ahead of the entropy of older equipment and aging bodies this past year, certain that we will be able to assure you all that we will be back at it again this next.
So, as this year draws to a close, we need to give thanks for many things, but first of which is our amazing farm Crew. Most of our crew is growing older with us. Many have been here for more than 25 years helping to build our farm. They are remarkable human beings who have raised families and become farmers here with us. Full Belly has been built by many hands, and continues each year to be blessed by the care and commitment of this crew of farmers.
In the past couple of years, a wonderfully talented team has been assembled here at the Full Belly Office. They are also critical to our complex small business but often remain unacknowledged.
Elaine keeps the CSA organized and informed with her writing while being a connecting link to all jobs in the office. She has the strength and character to stare down a Mountain Lion- and did so earlier this year on her morning bike ride to the office.
Paola does sales to restaurants, stores, curious individuals, and wholesalers, and then communicates orders to all the farm crew. She first worked here packing vegetables and now works the order desk every morning, organizing all that needs to get picked, and distributing order sheets to the field for each day’s harvest.
Stephanie – who will be going on maternity leave for the first part of the next year – is our amazingly sharp HR professional, coordinating health insurance, compliance, medical issues and trainings while being a thoughtful ear for issues that might arise among our crew of 80.
Alexa is our Berkeley Farmers market lead while organizing events here. She plans for school group visits and their education, farm dinners, special events, and was central to the remarkable Hoes Down Harvest Festival this past October. One of the farm’s missions is to create a farm that is both transparent and tangible. Alexa monitors the door, teaches, works with nervous brides’ mothers, and welcomes many to the farm each year.
We are fortunate to have a gentle patient smart bookkeeper here. Combining the sharp skills of exact accounting with a gentle sweetness that is so soft spoken, Natalia keeps our financial house in order. We are hoping that the perks of fresh vegetables and a quiet place in the country keeps her here at the farm for many years. She is great.
Finally we have Perla and Malinda who do part time detail management here. Perla is a daughter of two of our long-term employees and will be learning HR processes while Stephanie is on leave. Malinda is a neighbor and friend who loves her horses and part time conversations here about her 49ers.
Orchestrating most all of this is Dru. Her skill and sensitivity keep the crew inspired as she is like the mother hen to all. Most details drop into her lap and she rather brilliantly deals with everything from sales to flower growing or to inevitable small screwups.
Our farm here will be entering its 41st year in the Capay Valley. That time spans from the nationwide Farm Depression of the early 80’s when the national agricultural scene was losing farms and farmers to harsh economic realities. This time of exodus was the time of our beginning. The changed paradigm was to reduce the solutions/dependence of modern farming who purchase high-cost inputs to a system that optimizes what the environment of a farm can provide for free: nurturing rather than engineering.
With the rise of the Organic Marketplace, organic farmers began the reorientation of dominant Agricultural production focused on chemically based solutions to understanding the biological underpinnings of soil health, plant health, carbon cycling and the linkages to human health and wellbeing. Over 41 years, Full Belly has been part of that re-imagining.
The broad strokes of what defines a culture- food traditions, local connections to place, care and stewardship, right relationships, family, or community – are in danger of being lost to the economic forces that build sameness, consumerism, warehouse shopping, or mall allure. Our sanctuary as a farm and community hub speaks to the hope that we will choose intelligence built on experience, affection, and delight. Our relationships and the culture that we share with you is focused on care of this land and healthy outcomes of that care. We are bound by what four seasons allow, adapting and at the same time realizing the history of what has been chosen by those who came before us, embodied in each seed that we plant.
2024 as a farming year required adaptability. We were challenged with rains coming at regular intervals through Winter and early Spring. We transplanted lettuce by hand in a wet February. Potatoes and spring grains were planted much later than usual. We saw some key people in the farm move on- to jobs with shorter regular hours and better retirement plans. A week of 115-117 degree heat challenged us with working conditions that required earlier starts and stops to avoid the humid heat in the fields.
The challenge to plant on time this spring and the struggle with high summer temps was mitigated by the fact that we had resilient people, soils, and enough water. Our blessings come from good land, rainfall, and the sunlight that moderates heat or cold. It is generally a generous bargain. 2024 was an abundant year with beautiful crops and healthy grandchildren. Our crew ate well, as did we. Our community, including many of you, came to this wonderful land to celebrate, make a wreath, and share a walk or a meal.
Thank you for being part of our 2024. We look forward to a rest and then the energy to do it again this next year. We hope that you will enjoy the continuing journey with us. Happy Holidays.
Paul Muller
