OFI 635: Ranching Cattle On The Most Expensive Urban Interface In The United States | FFA SAE Edition | Jenna Fields | Ann Sobrato High School FFA

SHOW NOTES

INTRODUCING JENNA FIELDS!

We talk a lot about farming the rural/urban interface on this show.  But we have never interviewed anyone who is on the forefront of this clash of communities like today’s guest, Jenna Fields.

Jenna is the sixth generation on her families cattle ranch in Southeast San Jose, California.  She intends to keep this ranch running for generations to come.  However, her families property is being slowly enveloped by subdivisions, business parks and urban sprawl in the most expensive city and county of the United States.

Being located right in the heart of the Silicon Valley creates challenges for a cattle ranch, but it also creates some opportunities.  Jenna states that one of the locations on the ranch where they will brand cattle has pedestrian traffic going by.  There have not been any confrontations yet, but she has seen the look in people’s eyes who do not know ranching and don’t understand what they are doing or why they are doing it.

Jenna’s desire to keep the ranch going and her observations about people losing touch with where their meat comes from has helped to inspire her choice of majors.  She is going into her sophomore year at Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo and majoring in agricultural communications to help educate others on how farming and ranching works.  This is in part to market their cattle, and in part to minimize conflicts with her new neighbors.

Along the way Jenna has developed her own herd of 25 mother cows, she has won regional proficiency awards and been a state finalist, and she will be receiving her American Degree this coming October!

SUPERVISED AGRICULTURAL EXPERIENCE: Beef Production

HIGH SCHOOL: Ann Sobrato High School; Morgan Hill, California

MASCOT: Bulldogs

FFA ADVISOR: Samantha Lima

CONTACT INFORMATION FOR JENNA FIELDS:

Click on the picture below to be taken to the Ann Sobratro High School Ag. Department’s website:

Jenna’s FFA Advisor’s Email Address: limas@mhusd.org

Ann Sobrato High School’s Telephone Number: (408) 201-6200

FFA LINKS:

National FFA Organization

Supervised Agricultural Experiences (SAE’s)

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Donate to FFA – One way that FFA students are able to start small businesses is through an FFA grant of $1,000.  In 2014, 141 FFA students received these grants.  With your donations, more students can get this head start – pay it forward.

REASONS TO DONATE TO FFA:

• Only 2% of Americans grow and raise most of the food and livestock consumed by the other 98% as well as the rest of the world.  FFA is providing the needed education, training and resources to Americans that will carry that torch forward and insure that America continues to have inexpensive, quality food.
• Rural Communities will rely on entrepreneurship in the future for population growth and job creation.  The FFA is a major catalyst to that entrepreneurial growth.
• Farmers, ranchers and those working in agriculture give the rest of America incredible amounts of freedom because the search for food is as simple as going to the grocery store:

“Because American farmers are able to provide for so many of us, they give more and more of us the freedom to pursue goals and livelihoods beyond growing the food we need to survive.”

U.S. Secretary of Agriculture, Tom Vilsack 

Other Places You Can Listen To Us:

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