For those of us who have been attending local farmers markets over the years, there’s one vendor we can always count on: Sierra Valley Farms’ Gary Romano. Without a doubt, we know he will be standing under the awning in the back of his truck, chatting enthusiastically to each customer while selling his organic, freshly cut, washed and bagged European mix, spinach, and romaine lettuces. We know he will be smiling because he always smiles, and we know he will take the time to ask how we are. But few of us knew until recently of his interesting background, which he has just published in a memoir and passionate discourse on farming, “Why I Farm: Risking It All for a Life on the Land” (published by Bona Fide Books out of South Lake Tahoe).
The story begins with his Italian ancestors who came from the old country, one side to grow and sell flowers, the other side to raise cattle. Romano grew up working on his parents’ numerous flower farms in Cupertino, San Jose, and Morgan Hill, not an easy life for a kid who had to wake up at 2 a.m. in order to head off to San Francisco’s Union Square to sell flowers to wholesale florists. He worked seven days a week, both in the Bay Area and on his grandparents’ farm in the Sierra Valley. What teenager wouldn’t want to run away from pulling weeds and doing all the chores necessary to run a farm? Romano found that escape at Cal Poly in San Luis Obispo, where he transitioned into a career in parks and recreation for 17 years, a profession he believed would be his first and last. But in 1989, he answered a phone call that changed the course of his life: “‘Hello Gary, this is Aunt Betty,’” Romano recalls. “‘Emilio and I have put up the 65-acre ranch here in Beckwourth for sale. Do you want to buy it?’” Everyone knows a farmer’s life isn’t an easy one, and in Romano’s book he recounts the numerous obstacles small farmers face. Tax laws, lending restrictions, unnecessary farming rules and regulations that are not relevant to small farms: “The systems in this country are broken and currently they are set up for small farmers to fail, not to help create or sustain small farms.”
So, to answer the title of his book, why farm? Because farming is the best way to live. He writes: “To be outdoors in the fresh mountain air, put in a good day of hard work and get some exercise, and reap the harvest of my labor to feed my neighbors.” And because of family. Case in point, this past Father’s Day, Romano and his father, 86, weeded together. “It seemed appropriate to be doing that on Father’s Day.” It’s a good life, Romano says, one he hopes to inspire others to try, or at least support, but he doesn’t want to “throw young famers into the lion’s den.”
New farmers need to know the harsh realities, he advises, and also how to cope with them, change them, and to diversify. Romano is the master of diversification, doing anything and everything merely to survive. Other than attending farmers markets in Tahoe City, Truckee, and Reno, having an on-site farmers market at his own Sierra Valley farm, and providing produce for local restaurants, Romano puts on summer barn dinners on his farm cooked by local chefs. To further diversify, Romano is thinking of getting into the small animal business: chickens, turkeys, hogs, sheep, and rabbits, perhaps a milk cow and a milk goat. He has already started work on his next book, “July and Winter: The Growing Seasons of the Sierra for Farmers and Gardeners,” to be publsihed in 2014.
Food guru Michael Pollan states in his book “Food Rules:” “Eat well-grown food from healthy soil.” Is it really that simple? Well, for those of us who simply grab a bag of lettuce, yes, it’s that easy. For small farmers like Gary Romano, no, it’s not that simple. But it doesn’t make him any less passionate about what he does. Romano is trying to save the small farmer, but ultimately he wants to save us all.
For more information about Gary Romano and Sierra Valley Farms, visit sierravalleyfarms.com.
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