Theme: profile

The animal program at Full Belly farm is a way for the interns to experience the responsibilities of caring for a diverse group of animals. As an intern, I have learned how to properly care for laying hens, cows, sheep, goats and pigs as an integrated part of an organic vegetable farm. Antonio Cruz is the shepherd here at the farm, and his wealth of knowledge and experience with farm animals makes every day dynamic and challenging.

Antonio has worked at Full Belly for twelve years, eight of which he has worked full time with the animals. He is from Ciudad Altamirano, Guerrero in Mexico, where his three daughters, Almadellia, Esmeralda and Sulmarisandi still live. Besides a few months on a vineyard, he has worked at Full Belly since he came to the US to live with his brother in the Capay Valley. Before coming to the US, Antonio worked on a ranch caring for eighty cows. Every morning at 3am, he and two other men would spend the first four hours of their day milking the eighty cows by hand! As a new milker that finds milking one cow by hand challenging, the thought of milking for four hours straight is very impressive! [Read more…]

Full Belly Farm is blessed to have some wonderful folks working here every day, and this week we want to introduce one of them to our CSA members, Inigo Encarnación, who has been working here since 2011. 

Inigo was born in the state of Guerrero, in southern Mexico, in a small village called Huehuetonoc.  That’s an Amuzgo Indian word signifying the tambor, a musical instrument. Inigo has three older sisters, two of whom are now teachers in Mexico. His father grew corn, beans and squash for the family, and had several cows.  Inigo helped out in the fields and enjoyed milking the cows with his father, who he called Jefe. [Read more…]

With 80 or more people working at Full Belly it is sometimes daunting to get to know everyone.  There are field crews, a packing-shed crew, CSA customer-support staff, irrigation crews, an animal-care crew and a marketing team, just to mention a few.  Occasionally, we take space in the Beet to feature one of our staff, thinking that our members may also like to get to know the people that pick their vegetables.  Previously, we have always interviewed someone who has worked at the farm for many years, usually year-round. This week, in contrast, we talked with Angel Martinez who has only worked at the farm for a short while.

Angel started working at Full Belly a few months ago, at the height of the summer busyness, and in that short time he has been assigned quite a variety of tasks – “a little bit of everything” as he put it: packing peaches; planting strawberries, onions, broccoli and cabbage; sorting nuts; working on the almond-sheller; pulling stakes out of the ground in old tomato fields; pulling up plastic row cover and drip lines from finished fields; and of course, picking vegetables like eggplants and chilies. [Read more…]

 Faces from the Fields

Maria Machado has worked at Full Belly Farm for five years, sometimes packing tomatoes and at other times picking fruits and vegetables.  Her husband Sergio works at the farm as well, on the irrigation crew. Last June, Maria was put in charge of her own picking crew. We wanted to tell a little bit of her story to our CSA members since Maria is an important part of the chain of many hands and many people’s dedicated efforts, that result in the CSA boxes that you enjoy every week.  

On a recent afternoon when Maria’s crew was picking padron peppers we sat and talked for a few minutes. The weather was a bit cooler and more comfortable than it has been in weeks past. From where we sat, when I reminded Maria that most of the people getting CSA boxes live in the city, and may never have worked on a farm, we couldn’t help looking around and feeling happy to see the hills on either side of us, the trees providing shade to sit under, and the sounds of the wind moving across the field. [Read more…]

It’s time to meet another one of Full Belly’s crew. This week we would like to introduce you to Catalina Soto.

When did you start working at Full Belly Farm?

About 9 years ago.

What was different back then?

It has changed little by little. I learn every day. The farm was smaller when I got here, there were fewer flowers, melons and tomatoes. Now there is so much of everything! My first day I started picking bunches of chard with Alfonso and Jose. I don’t remember what else I picked my first day! Since then I have picked beans, cherry tomatoes, eggplant – I’ve picked all of it, but I haven’t driven the tractors or worked with the animals. Now I don’t pick anymore, instead I am in the packing shed and in the afternoon I organize the pallets and load trucks. [Read more…]

This is one in our series of interviews in which we introduce our CSA members to the people who pick and pack the fruits and vegetables from Full Belly Farm.

Beet: Alfonso, could you tell our CSA members about your job here at Full Belly?

Alfonso: My work is to organize and pick the heirloom tomatoes. My group also picks basil.

B: And in the cool months?

A: We also pick the greens – chards and kales, and carrots.

B: How long have you worked at Full Belly?

A: I started in 1997. [Read more…]

This week we wanted to let our CSA members learn a little bit more about the people who work at Full Belly Farm, so we interviewed one of the crew members who irrigates the crops, Arturo Gaxiola.

Full Belly: First, please tell me a bit about your job at FB.
Arturo Gaxiola: My job is irrigating, the water. For example, we have several types of sprinkler right now: one type is the drip line like we use in the grapes and now we are also irrigating the peaches with special permanent drip lines. They are above the ground, with little sprinkles in between every two trees. I think the fruit is going to be better.

[Read more…]