Today, 5th generation grower Reba Guzman shares how her favorite memories growing up influenced her decision to become a farmer.
Shoutout to Reba and all of the the women out there paving the way for others in the agriculture industry!
Video Transcript:
“I’m Reba and I’m a fifth generation apple, pear, and cherry grower at Gebbers Farms in Brewster, Washington. I grew up in the orchard environment. I grew up working cherry harvest, apple harvest. Even in the winter we would wind up at the office doing odd jobs here and there, whatever. My favorite memories would definitely be in the cherries. We worked loading docks and they were always busy and always chaotic. And one time we were out there and a main water line broke. The water was overflowing, like massive amounts of water were coming out and it was chaotic. And there were bins coming out and we had to tag them. And we have to keep the water going on the fruit and we completely quit, dropped everything that we had, and we’re running under the spraying water. And we got fired for approximately five minutes because our aunts and uncles were not going to tag the bins and so they had to rehire us. We grew up in the orchards so a lot of times I thought I was working and I was really doing a thing but really my parents had left me out in an orchard to be babysat by the crew boss that was actually doing the work and I was not. So there’s countless memories. I grew up out there, we’re still working out there. My mom was actually a nurse, she wanted me to be a nurse but I just couldn’t do it. I love the orchard, I love the farming, and I knew I wanted to come back here.”
