(Earth Eats theme music, composed by Erin Tobey and performed by Erin and Matt Tobey)

KAYTE YOUNG: From WFIU in Bloomington Indiana, I'm Kayte Young and this is Earth Eats.

ROSS GAY: and blows a kiss

to the tree which everyone knows
cannot grow this far north
being Mediterranean
and favoring the rocky, sun-baked soils
of Jordan and Sicily
but no one told the fig tree

KAYTE YOUNG: This week on our show Ross Gay shares a poem shares a poem featuring the opposite of social distancing under a fig tree in Philadelphia, and Bloomington neighbors share tips on raising figs here in the Midwest. Producer Violet Baron interviews of butcher in a grocery store at the start of pandemic, and Harvest Public Media has a story about young farmers and student loan debt. All that and more just to head, so stay with us. 

RENEE REED: Earth Eats is produced from the campus of Indiana University in Bloomington Indiana. We wish to acknowledge and honor the indigenous communities native to this region and recognize that Indiana University Bloomington is built on indigenous homelands and resources.  We recognize the Miami, Delaware, Potawatomi, and Shawnee people as past, present, and future caretakers of this land.

KAYTE YOUNG: Our first story comes from producer Violet Baron, in partnership with Indiana University Center for Rural Engagement, we're bringing you a few of the stories from the series Growing in Place from the summer of 2020. The series shares the stories of food workers and community leaders who have kept people fed in an unprecedented time. This piece is an interview with Juan Ruffin who works as a butcher at a grocery store in Indianapolis. 

JUAN RUFFIN: I used to be the type of person that people fought for. And so it was hard for me to step out there. It was hard for me to say anything. So people stood up for me, and as I got older and as I started having children, I told my children all the time, do it because it's the right thing to do. So in order for me to say that, I have to live that.
(Banjo music)
My name is Juan Ruffin, and I am a butcher at Krogers for 23 years. I also am a union steward and an executive board member. 

VIOLET BARRON: To get to your plate, someone's got to raise the meat, and someone's got to cut that meat in package it up for you. Juan's worked at Kroger in Indianapolis for 23 years and he's been a union member that whole time. As a butcher his job is specialized, it takes skill and strength to lift big pieces of meat and cut them for customers.
We talked by phone after he finished his shift about work and about this wild summer. A typical day for Juan falls into a routine, stocking, storing meat, and cutting it for orders. But when covid hit that changed a lot. As a grocery store employee, Juan is considered an essential worker. That means he never sheltered in place. He was always expected to keep on working throughout the outbreak and he saw a lot of things in those shutdown days. 

JUAN RUFFIN: They were several customers that came to the grocery store every day because there was literally nothing else to do. And a lot of them came in without masks on, and a lot of times they were not purchasing anything, it was just something to do, just to get out. It was really exhausting because everybody grocery shops. Everybody has to eat. So if that's all they could do, that's all they were doing. And so we were busy, like extremely. I've never seen us busy that much. And everyday. 

VIOLET BARRON: He says that's calmed down now that Indiana is opening up again, but he still concerned especially since the virus is far from under control just yet. Like when cases first started to rise in Indy, Kroger announced it would limit stores to half capacity. 

JUAN RUFFIN: Half capacity is what we are on an extremely busy day, so it wasn't really eliminating exposure, it was just meeting the demands of a PR stunt actually, because if you're saying we're limiting a store to half capacity, and every Kroger that I've ever worked at has never been at half capacity even at their busiest moments, then you're really just saying words because you're not limiting anything. What are you doing? What are you doing for us? You're not making it any safer for anybody because we never operated at capacity. There's never ever fifteen hundred people in a Kroger for any reason, it's not a concert hall, it's a grocery store. So saying you're limiting capacity is not doing anything safety wise. 

VIOLET BARRON: He says at the core there's a discrepancy between what Kroger is saying and what they're actually doing. 

JUAN RUFFIN: That was my whole issue when, what has it been? Maybe a month now that they changed our dress code to make masks a part of our uniform, so they were required for us to wear them, but they never required the customers to wear them. When it first got really bad that was one of my concerns. These customers are coming in here every day, exposing us everyday, and you're not requiring them to wear masks. 

VIOLET BARRON: And in the earliest days of the pandemic when Indiana was fully shut down in March and April, Juan says there were no official protocols in place for limiting exposure. He remembers a day when one of his co-workers tested positive for covid, and no one was sure what to do aside from calling the health department. The store shut down for a few hours, but there weren't clear rules on how to distance after that to keep everyone there safe. 

JUAN RUFFIN: But we didn't feel any safer after that. We didn't feel any more secure after that because we still had to go, because I'm not sure what department this person worked in, but if they worked in the deli department and you can't shut the store down and clean the deli department, we still have the contact or protocol to clock in we have to touch the, it read your fingerprint. So we all have to touch this timeclock to clock in, so you're cleaning the deli department, but if this person buys groceries or this person stops at a register, we have touch screens, u-scan, you have to touch the time clock, we're still exposed. So no one felt any safer.
Fortunate for us in service departments we have to be extra sanitary. So washing your hands and using sanitizer and all of that stuff is a requirement in the service department. So as far as exposure, I wasn't too concerned about myself, but for my coworkers that were a little bit older or a little bit unhealthy, had some of the things that they said that would be concerning, those were who I was worried about. And I'm sure they were even more worried about it. And several of them self-quarantined and took the loss. Because they were afraid. 

VIOLET BARRON: And Juan says that a lot of them made those calls really early on before Kroger granted paid time off for sick workers. Before that they were required to use vacation time. Now Kroger offers 14 days of paid leave for workers who test positive for covid or who have verified symptoms. And as of July 2nd, Kroger is requiring everyone in its stores to wear masks. We reached out to them, but they didn't respond to requests for comments on their policies this summer.
Juan's union is called the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union or UCFW and it's won some rights for its workers in Indiana its Local 700 chapter. They got members more distance between workstations in places where that was possible and social distance in break rooms, and they're still fighting. They're working at the state level and across the country to give better benefits to workers on the front lines, and to limit their exposure to the virus. Since Juan's a union steward he advocates for his co-workers and he makes sure they feel safe at work. But for him being in union leadership goes even deeper than that, as an autistic person advocacy means a lot to him. 

JUAN RUFFIN: I used to be the type of person that people fought for because being autistic is hard. I have what’s called pervasive developmental disorder, which is a social anxiety. And so it was hard for me to step out there, it was hard for me to say anything. So people stood up for me. And as I got older and I started having children, I tell my children all the time, do it because it's the right thing to do. So in order for me to say that I have to live that. A part of watching people get mistreated and knowing what our rights were, I decided to step up and be a union steward, because I've had store managers that took advantage of people not knowing what our contract said. So I felt it was only fair to help them and show them that they don't have to take a bunch of crap from someone because they don't know what they can and cannot do. You want what’s best for those that can't. 

VIOLET BARRON: And of course this summer hasn't just been about the virus, it's also been about protest in over 350 cities and many including Indy, involving violent clashes with police. Juan's watching it all.

JUAN RUFFIN: Okay so I am a 47-year-old black male. So these last few months have been an extra lot. And understanding and recognizing the significance of Juneteenth compared to the 4th of July which is considered Independence Day. And knowing that the history of Juneteenth and the 4th of July. It has been a lot to discern and not to be probably as vocal as I should be because I am an American. I was born here, I was raised here. My parents were born here and raised here. My grandparents were born here and raised here. So we are Americans. And I could probably go six or seven generations, but I also recognize that as African Americans, which I use the term loosely because I was born here, that as an American we celebrate the 4th of July as Independence Day for Americans. But recognizing my history, I've celebrated Juneteenth as Independence Day for Africans / Americans.
As far as heritage goes, there's a lineage. They say if you don't learn from you history you're doomed to repeat it or something like that. I've always taught my children to learn from mistakes. They don't have to be your mistakes, but you can learn from them. And to also be proud of who you are. And if you do it because it's the right thing. I've learned a lot from this covid pandemic, and the Black Lives Matter Movement and it's a lot of information because we are at a point in time where information is flooded. 

VIOLET BARRON: Flooded? 

JUAN RUFFIN: It's flooded. There is a lot of information out there and you have to do a lot of research to find out what's true and what's not. And because all we've had is time because of covid-19, we've had a lot of time to hear a lot of things and learn a lot of stuff. And I hate that it had to come to covid-19 for us to realize all the things that we take for granted like the ability to go out and do things and enjoy people. That's one of the things that I miss the most. I'm autistic but I love my relationships. I gain a lot from being around people a lot. All I've had is my coworkers for the last thirteen months. I haven't seen friends, I haven't seen family because I have a lot of family that were high risk. So talking on the phone is good but being around a person that you like being around is a lot better. And I've tried to teach my children to always enjoy the time that you have because it's limited.
This year at Kroger has made me more tired than I've ever been in my life. I've worked more hours then I've ever worked in my life because if you're trying to do a job and they're a lot of butchers left, there's a lot of people that work in meat shops but there are not a lot of butchers left, there's not a lot of people that can pull the cow and cut it in half and seam it down and get all the cuts that you like, T-bones, New York Strips, ribeye, filet mignon. There's not a lot of us left. So when you're limited in how many people can do a job, and then covid hits, and a few of those people get self-quarantined, then if you're not self quarantined then all of that falls on you. And that's what happened to me. My boss is high risk. He's diabetic, and his doctor made him quarantine. So the only person that could cut meat like he cuts meat is yours truly. So I have worked more hours, busier than I've ever worked this far along in any year of my life. 

VIOLET BARRON: He's always thinking and innovating though. If you call his phone and leave a message it says you've reached Fat Cakes by Ruff, which is a bakery that specializes in cheesecakes. That's his side business for now, but he says he hopes to eventually move to full-time and leave Kroger behind. 

JUAN RUFFIN: You know when you're a butcher, lifting 70, 80, 90, 100 pound slabs of meat for 23 years takes a toll on your body. I love cutting meat but I enjoy the thrill of making someone's taste buds happy by making dessert. 

KAYTE YOUNG: This story originally aired on the podcast Growing in Place produced and hosted by Violet Barron with editorial support from Elaine Monahan and the team at Indiana Environmental Reporter. Growing in Place the production of Indiana University Center for Rural Engagement.
The covid-19 pandemic has increased the demand for backyard chickens and other birds. For hatcheries getting newborn chicks to their owner is a race against time. But as Harvest Public Media's Seth Bodine reports, severe weather makes the process more challenging. 

SETH BODINE: The peeps of thousands of small fuzzy freshly hatched chicks drifts Cackle Hatchery in Lebanon Missouri.
(Sound of machine whirring and chicks peeping)
From February to October 300,000 eggs are delivered every 7 days to the hatchery. Jeff Smith is a third-generation owner of the business and says they have about 200 varieties of birds. 

JEFF SMITH: We have some Blue Americana’s over here and Cream Legbars. Now they lay out a blue egg. And we have some Splash Americana’s, up there they lay a blue egg. And then there's a box there that says Buckeye. 

SETH BODINE: Logistics is the name of the game at Cackle Hatchery. They take orders months in advance, about a million eggs or either in incubators or hatchers. It takes approximately 3 weeks until they hatch, then a team of about a hundred employees spring into action. They're separating hens from roosters, vaccinating them, and packing them up, all within a couple of hours. 

JEFF SMITH: We're 24/7 here. Everybody is tapped out on the time and energy that they can put into it. 

SETH BODINE: The anatomy of the baby birds helps them survive shipping. Dana Zook the livestock extension specialist for Oklahoma Cooperative Extension. She says when chicks are about to hatch, they absorb the yolk inside of their egg. 

DANA ZOOK: Which gives it some energy and some ability to have some energy for about 48 to 72 hours. 

SETH BODINE: Smith adds that the chicks also have a heightened immune system the first three days that helps them weather extreme temperatures. After that things can get dicey. Which is why they rely on the speedy delivery from the US Postal Service. But because of sub-zero temperatures in February, the post office put an embargo on live shipments. That's cause all sorts of headaches are Smith's business. 

JEFF SMITH: It's just really hard to manage cause we're already taxed that our limit, and we just don't have automated systems in place that can manage shuffling all these orders around. 

SETH BODINE: They do the best they can to help the chicks get to the owner safely. Hatchery employees put bedding in the boxes for better insulation and to absorb the moisture. But Smith says it's hard to know what each shipping process will look like. 

JEFF SMITH: Very difficult to know how to pack them because we don't know specifically if they're going to be on a truck for 2 hours or are they going to be on a truck for 12 hours. 

SETH BODINE: Despite the hatcheries best efforts, they don't always win the race. Sharodha Matlock raises and sells hundreds of chickens in Depew Oklahoma. She wanted a separate flock for children. 

SHARODHA MATLOCK: I was like this will give my kids something to do, like they can raise their own birds. They don't have to mess with mine. 

SETH BODINE: So she placed an order for 64 chickens in January and received a shipment date for February. Only four chicks survive the trip that would take about four hours in a car. 

SHARODHA MATLOCK: They all got cold and died, that's what happened.

SETH BODINE: Those extreme conditions are why the US Postal Service put a two-week embargo on live animal shipments in February. Mark Inglett is a spokesperson for the Postal Service. Embargoes are pretty rare, he says. When they do happen, it's to protect the animals.
MARK INGLETT: We don't want to put them at risk so during circumstances like that we won't be accepting them for mailing at those times. 

SETH BODINE: But these types of shipments are very common. The Kansas City Regional Center had more than 43,000 live shipments between February and October last year. The bargo was temporary, but for Smith he had to figure out how to sell thousands of chicks that couldn't be shipped. So he had to have local bargain sales and make countless calls. As for Matlock she won't be getting her replacement shipment of birds until June. Seth Bodine, Harvest Public Media.
KAYTE YOUNG: Find more from our Harvest Partners at HarvestPublicMedia.org. 

After a short break, Christina Stella has a story about vaccinations for farm workers. 

(Music) 

I'm Kayte Young, you're listening to Earth Eats. More than half all-farm workers hired in the U.S. are from Mexico. And right now many are making their way to farms across the country on temporary work visas. Some states are prioritizing these workers in their vaccine roll-out plans and are already getting shots into arms. As Harvest Public Media's Dana Cronin reports, for many farm workers at this point vaccines are far more accessible here than in their home countries. 

DANA CRONIN: White vans carrying small groups of farm workers drive up periodically to the Parish Hall at St Joseph Catholic Church in Cobden Illinois, dropping off groups of men who have recently arrived from Mexico. Many of them will be here until October on temporary agricultural work visas, and on only their third day here, they're getting vaccinated. 34-year-old Jorge Feria has just arrived from Oaxaca Mexico. Moments after receiving his shot he felt relieved. 

JORGE FERIA: (Spanish)
TRANSLATOR: We have the fortune to come work through a visa and have the government that cares about the people that come to work in the fields. We are very grateful. 

DANA CRONIN: He says if he had stayed in Mexico, he wouldn't be vaccinated. In fact he doesn't know anyone in Mexico who is yet gotten the shot. It's a big deal for many of these workers. Farm workers have been hit particularly hard by the pandemic. According to researchers at Purdue University, in the U.S. alone it's estimated that hundreds of thousands of agricultural workers have tested positive for the virus and thousands have died. Jose Martinez rolls up the sleeve of his blue tie dye t-shirt in preparation for the shot.
(General chatter)
Martinez who's originally from Mexico now lives in Illinois year-round working as a forklift operator at a farm. He says most of his family also works on farms and almost all are vaccinated. His parents though remain in Mexico.
JOSE MARTINEZ: (Spanish) 

TRANSLATOR: We're not vaccinated yet because in Mexico it's really hard to get.
DANA CRONIN: Carlos Leonardo Magis Rodrigues teaches medicine at the National Autonomous University of Mexico.
CARLOS RODRIGUES: The problem is that we don't have enough vaccines. 

DANA CRONIN: He says the supply issues mean that most Mexican residents, even healthcare workers aren't vaccinated. Mexico's vaccine distribution plan is age based, and Magis Rodriguez says he expects 20- to 30-year-olds won't become eligible until maybe next January. Meaning many of the farm workers getting their shots in the US now will likely be nearly a full year ahead of their peers back home. Some farm workers say many of their friends and family members are afraid to get vaccinated after hearing false information and conspiracy theories. 

ELEAZAR CHAVEZ: (Spanish) 

TRANSLATOR: That the government is against the people and that they're putting the virus in our bodies. 

DANA CRONIN: Eleazar Chavez also recently arrived from Oaxaca on a work visa. The night before getting vaccinated, he attended an informational session put on by a local health clinic. Karla Grathler ran that Q&A session; she says many workers come in both concerned and unprepared for the vaccine and it's important to dispel myths right away with accurate information about vaccines. 

KARLA GRATHLER: How they work in the body, what kinds of vaccines we have in the market, what kind of vaccines we are going to receive today, and then what to expect after receiving the vaccines. So they know, they can identify, okay I have fever, I have chills okay, well that alarm, obviously. My body is responding to vaccine. 

DANA CRONIN: After some initial hesitation Grathler says all 22 of the most recently arrived farmworkers got their vaccine shots. I'm Dana Cronin, Harvest Public Media. 

KAYTE YOUNG: This story was co-reported with Side Effects Public Media's Christine Herman. Find more from this reporting collective at HarvestPublicMedia.org
(Music)
Last spring in the early months of the pandemic, many people took up gardening and growing food. For some it was a survival response to the food shortages they were seeing in the grocery stores. For some it was the result of having more time at home to tend to plants. And for others it was a source of joy and stress relief during a difficult time.
Based on the reports of shortages from retail seed companies it sounds like the increased interest in home gardening continues into this spring planting season. As the seed packets arrive in the mail, many of us are dreaming of our fruitful garden patches and delicious future meals. And when you plant a fruit tree, you can't help but look to the future. Sometimes way in the future. It usually takes years for trees to bear fruit. Orchardists are in it for the long haul, and Schertz said she hadn't thought too far ahead when she purchased her fig tree 7 years ago. 
ANN SCHERTZ: I bought it from May's Greenhouse. 

KAYTE YOUNG: She says it was an impulse buy. 

ANN SCHERTZ: But I was inspired by the Bloomington Community Orchard when I saw their fig and how big it had grown, and that it was producing figs. I thought, "I want one of those!" It was a Chicago fig. 

ALAN SCHERTZ: Chicago Hardee, is that the terminology or...?

ANN SCHERTZ: I think you're right. 

ALAN SCHERTZ: Okay

ANNA SCHERTZ: I thought if it could survive in Chicago, then it would probably do pretty well in Bloomington Indiana. 

KAYTE YOUNG: [Narrating] Ann Schertz lives with her husband Alan Schertz in the Bryan Park Neighborhood in central Bloomington. We used to be neighbors. She's a professional photographer, and he works for the City of Bloomington. They have a lot of other interests like baking, building, gardening. You might catch Alan gliding across campus on a longboard in the summer, or the two of them walking their little dog McGee in the neighborhood. Oh, and you might say they're foodies. 

[Interviewing] So maybe we can do like a levels check, just tell me what you had for breakfast. 

ANN SCHERTZ: Today we had crepes with gruyere cheese, sautéed mushrooms, spinach and eggs. 

ALAN SCHERTZ: It was pretty nice. Yeah, I appreciated it. 

KAYTE YOUNG: That is definitely the best "What did you have for breakfast" breakfast, that I've ever gotten. 

[Alan, Ann and Kayte laugh] 

KAYTE YOUNG: I invited them on the show to talk about their fig tree. I started by asking them why figs?

ALAN SCHERTZ: I think Ann has always wanted for choosing a plant and would lean towards something that would produce food. And the fig leaves are beautiful so it's quite pleasant to look at it, and it is really fun to eat figs. 

ANN SCHERTZ: I think also because it seemed a little exotic, and like something that I never thought we could grow in Indiana. And then once I learned that we could, I was really excited about planting something in my yard that I could look forward to picking every year. 

KAYTE YOUNG: [Narrating] I know a couple other people in town with fig trees, but Ann and Alan's is the biggest, and it bears the most fruit. Their house lies along a familiar route through town for me, and the tree is in their side yard, right next to the road. So, I pass it almost daily. A few years ago in the winter, I noticed they'd built a sort of circular cage around it, with light wire fencing, and filled it in with dried leaves. Each year the cage got bigger as the tree grew. Last year they had it decorated with Christmas lights. 

ANN SCHERTZ: My neighbor bought us Christmas lights to put on it. 

ALAN SCHERTZ: So it would look like a cake.  

ANN SCHERTZ: So, it looks like a big cake at Christmas. 

KAYTE YOUNG: [Narrating] I wanted to learn their secret to fig tree success. I stopped by in the fall, when they were getting it ready for winter, and asked them to describe the process. 

When I arrived, they'd already set up the circular cage around the tree using steaks and lightweight wire fencing. They had started to fill it in with dried leaves and were dragging a tarp down the side of the road to a pecan tree on the corner. 

[Sound of a tarp rustling as it's dragged over pavement]

ANN SCHERTZ: Here we got lucky and we found out somebody how had bagged up about a dozen bags of leaves.

ALAN SCHERTZ: My old professor. 

ANN SCHERTZ: Giant bags and so we just sent him an email and asked him if we could have his leaves. 

KAYTE YOUNG: [To Ann] I'd say it's time.

ANN SCHERTZ: Yeah, especially when we're kind of in a pinch, it's cold so early this year. 

KAYTE YOUNG: [Narrating] They try to get it covered before the first frost, or at least the first hard freeze. This year's first cold snap came early. Many of the leaves hadn't even fallen on the trees yet, so they were happy for any leaves they could get their hands on. They dragged the tarp to the cage and started dumping in the leaves. 

[Sound of leaves rustling as they are packed] 

[Interviewing] What is the method here? Do you just dump it in there, or are you trying to get a specific, do you want to make sure it’s packed dense or...? 

ALAN SCHERTZ: I would say packed loose, like you can see I have a little void there. 

KAYTE YOUNG: Yeah.

ALAN SCHERTZ: So I'm not... my quality control is quite not... just not... but....

KAYTE YOUNG: But you probably want to trap some air in there too. 

ALAN SCHERTZ: Yes, I think that's right. I think the first year we did it we did not use straw. Maybe year two or three we did use straw at the base, and I think that's a good thing. I did not use straw at the base of this one, so we'll see. Again, I am no expert. 

KAYTE YOUNG: [Chuckles] I know. 

ALAN SCHERTZ: We are just winging it, you know what I mean? 

ANN SCHERTZ: [In the background] Still pretty loose. 

ALAN SCHERTZ: It's kind of more like a ritual. 

KAYTE YOUNG: [To Alan] Yeah.

[Narrating] It's a ritual that seems to work. What I noticed from other friend's fig trees is that in our climate certain varieties of fig trees will survive the winter, but they die back quite a bit, and each spring it takes a while to recover, and send out new growth. As a result, the tree doesn't get that much bigger from year to year. That's not the case with Ann and Alan's tree. 

[Interviewing] And so what is the purpose of putting a cage around it and packing it with leaves? Like what is your intention with that? What do you think it's doing?

ALAN SCHERTZ: I guess we're thinking its insulating it. I don't really know if it is, like we've never studied it or we don't really know what we're doing, but we just keep doing it each year that and it keeps producing, so. 

ANN SCHERTZ: Well I think I read to do that, and that it would help protect it from a hard freeze. 

ALAN SCHERTZ: Oh okay. 

ANN SCHERTZ: So, it seems to have worked though. I mean every year we get about twice as many figs as we did the year before, and this year we got, I think, somewhere in the ballpark of 200 figs. 

KAYTE YOUNG: [Interviewing] 200 figs, that's quite a bit. And so, do they come on all at once, or is it just sort of throughout the season? 

ANN SCHERTZ: Throughout the season.

ALAN SCHERTZ: Gradually. 

ANN SCHERTZ: Yeah it usually starts out with just one or two. You have to really keep looking for them because the fig's so big now that you really have to get in there and see where the figs are, and make sure you don't miss any of those delicious figs on that. 

KAYTE YOUNG: [Interviewing] So, speaking of delicious, what kind of things do you guys like to do with them since you have an abundant harvest? This isn't just like one or two a day. 

ALAN SCHERTZ: Fortunately, I think we mainly just eat them raw. I mean like when they ripen. But we've sautéed them...

ANN SCHERTZ: Sautéed them in butter and maple syrup and very lightly because you don't need to use very much because they're already a pretty sweet fruit. So, we cut them up and then we'll eat them with pancakes and waffles or on ice cream. 

ALAN SCHERTZ: Or even yogurt, we've had like fig yogurt parfait, a little granola, a little yogurt, little figgy. 

ANN SCHERTZ: And sometimes we've taken them to a friend of ours house and we've put them on pizza too, with goat cheese. 

ALAN SCHERTZ: Oh yeah, I forgot. We did. 

ANN SCHERTZ: It's very good. 

KAYTE YOUNG: [Interviewing] Have you ever preserved them like by making jam or dried them or anything? 

ANN SCHERTZ: We haven't gotten to that point where we have so many that we would do that. We mostly gobble them down just as they harvest. 

KAYTE YOUNG: [Interviewing] Do you give them away to friends and neighbors?

ALAN SCHERTZ: By all means. 

ANN SCHERTZ: We do because we want other people to experience the fig. They often have never had a fig. 

KAYTE YOUNG: Especially a fresh one. 

ANN SCHERTZ: Yes, or they thought that... like we have neighbors from Israel, and they thought that they could only get them in Israel, as far as... you know, growing them in the vicinity where they lived. So, that was exciting to them to know that that was a possibility. 

ALAN SCHERTZ: But it is a nice invitation, or I don't know what you all it, or fellowship sharing thing. So, it's a nice element as far as that goes, I think. 

ANN SCHERTZ: It's actually had people driving by too because I think people are curious when we're standing by it, wondering what we're doing. Because they don't recognize it as something that would be bearing fruit. So, they're curious and they ask us what we're doing, and we're basically almost getting inside the fig and trying to find the figs in there, so. 

KAYTE YOUNG: I think some people have never had a fresh fig and then, I especially thing people don't know what a fig tree looks like. So, all of that would mean people would be curious. 

ANN SCHERTZ: Absolutely, although there are some people who think "No, I'm not eating that, it looks weird." 

(Alan & Ann laugh) 

ALAN SCHERTZ: But then you're right! And then it's beautiful, yeah. 

ANN SCHERTZ: But then they slice it open and it's pink, it’s gorgeous on the inside. It looks kind of like a little ugly fruit on the outside, but you open it up and it's pink, and beautiful, and delicious. 

KAYTE YOUNG: Yeah so what does the outside look like? 

ALAN SCHERTZ: Outside color is initially green and then kind of turns brownish, almost kind of like a purply bruised color when it's starting to ripen. 

KAYTE YOUNG: Do you think anybody's picking? Cause I know that your fig is outside of your backyard fence, it's very...

ALAN SCHERTZ: It's accessible. 

KAYTE YOUNG: It's very open to the community. 

ALAN SCHERTZ: There's many individuals that we've said, "By all means, help yourself", but I also think, there's kind of like a respect that they're not gonna come and just harvest all of them or anything you know what I mean? It's just like a...[trails off]

KAYTE YOUNG: You said squirrels, what about deer? I know that this neighborhood is just overrun with deer sometimes. 

ALAN SCHERTZ: Yeah there is a lot of deer, but I don't think I've ever seen a deer chomping on a fig - not for the leaves, not for the fruit. 

ANN SCHERTZ: Either that they don’t like figs, or they have not discovered them. 
KAYTE YOUNG: My guess would be latter; they haven't discovered them because they will like them. 
[Kayte, Alan and Ann chuckle]

[Snappy Music] 

ANN SCHERTZ: I think for me mostly it's just nice to have something out in the yard that grows, and then I can pick the food and eat it. I don't feel like I'm being that resourceful. But it's just a fun thing to have in my life, to be able to do that. 

I don't know, I guess what I am learning is to try to grow things that grow easily in Indiana. I have tried to grow lots of fruits that don't necessarily do that well in Indiana and so to find something that does well, it pretty much takes care of itself besides covering it up in the winter. It just really brings me a lot of joy. 

ALAN SCHERTZ: It's definitely fun. I think the fellowship of the tree has been highlight for me. Just interacting with neighbors, kids, grownups. 

KAYTE YOUNG: As is often the case, fruit from their fig tree is more than food. It's a conversation starter, a connector. After a short break we have a poem from Ross Gay about the connections that can happen around a fig tree. Stay with us. 

[Music]

Kayte Young here, this is Earth Eats. Ross Gay is a poet and professor of English at Indiana University in Bloomington. His 2019 release, The Book of Delights, is a collection of essayits, each focusing on a particular delight experienced in his everyday life. It's not all hummingbirds, hickory and rice candy, it gets dark in places. We can only truly know delight by experiencing its opposite perhaps. 

Ross Gay has been featured this year on This American Life, All Things Considered, and Krista Tippett's podcast On Being. Last spring, I asked Ross if he could read from his poetry collection Catalog of Unabashed Gratitude, which was a finalist for a national book award in 2016 and winner of the 2016 Kingsley Tuft's Poetry Award and the 2015 National Book Critic Circle Award. Here's Ross Gay reading in his garden in 2020. 
ROSS GAY: To the fig tree on 9th and Christian. 
Tumbling through thecity in my
mind without once
looking up
the racket in
the lugwork probably
rehearsing some
stupid thing I
said or did
some crime or
other the city they
say is a lonely
place until yes
the sound of sweeping
and a woman
yes with a
broom beneath
which you are now
too the canopy
of a fig its
arms pulling the
September sun to it
and she
has a hose too
and so works hard
rinsing and scrubbing
the walk
lest some poor sod
slip on the
silk of a fig
and break his hip
and not probably
reach over to gobble up
the perpetrator
the light catches
the veins in her hands
when I ask about
the tree they
flutter in the air and
she says take
as much as
you can
help me
so I load my
pockets and mouth
and she points
to the step-ladder against
the wall to
mean more but
I was without a
sack so my meager
plunder would have to
suffice and an old woman
whom gravity
was pulling into
the earth loosed one
from a low slung
branch and its eye
wept like hers
which she dabbed
with a kerchief as she
cleaved the fig with
what remained of her
teeth and soon there were
eight or nine
people gathered beneath
the tree looking into
it like a
constellation pointing
do you see it
and I am tall and so
good for these things
and a bald man even
told me so
when I grabbed three
or four for
him reaching into the
giddy throngs of
yellow-jackets sugar
stoned which he only
pointed to smiling and
rubbing his stomach
I mean he was really rubbing his stomach
like there was a baby
in there
it was hot his
head shone while he
offered recipes to the
group using words which
I couldn’t understand and besides
I was a little
tipsy on the dance
of the velvety heart rolling
in my mouth
pulling me down and
down into the
oldest countries of my
body where I ate my first fig
from the hand of a man who escaped his country
by swimming through the night
and maybe
never said more than
five words to me
at once but gave me
figs and a man on his way
to work hops twice
to reach at last his
fig which he smiles at and calls
baby, c’mere baby,`
he says and blows a kiss
to the tree which everyone knows
cannot grow this far north
being Mediterranean
and favoring the rocky, sun-baked soils
of Jordan and Sicily
but no one told the fig tree
or the immigrants
there is a way
the fig tree grows
in groves it wants,
it seems, to hold us,
yes I am anthropomorphizing
goddammit I have twice
in the last thirty seconds
rubbed my sweaty
forearm into someone else’s
sweaty shoulder
gleeful eating out of each other’s hands
on Christian St.
in Philadelphia a city like most
which has murdered its own
people
this is true
we are feeding each other
from a tree
at the corner of Christian and 9th
strangers maybe
never again.

[Mysterious Music]
KAYTE YOUNG: That was Ross Gay, reading To The Fig Tree on 9th and Christian from his 2015 release Catalog of Unabashed Gratitude. His latest release is a book length poem called Be Holding. Ross Gay has collaborated with musicians such as Bonnie Vare and Angel Bat Dawid for a spoken word album available in early April. We have more information on our website, EarthEats.org. 
The average American farmer is going gray, with many farmers eyeing retirement a third of U.S. farmland is expected to change hands by 2035. Plenty of young people are eager to break into agriculture, but as Harvest Public Media's Christina Stella reports some say they face a barrier their parents didn't - student loan debt.
CHRISTINA STELLA: March will be a busy month for Cait Caughey the first-generation farmer selling produce, herbs, and native plants in southwest Iowa. She'll spend hours planting in the tiny greenhouse on her front lawn, flanked by vast cornfields.
CAIT CAUGHEY: Oh my gosh from now until the end of May I will be in here.
CHRISTINA STELLA: But if all goes according to plan, they'll finish growing in her biggest investment yet.
CAIT CAUGHEY: Fingers crossed, we don't know what's going to happen with like the mud puddle nature of March and April. But the new greenhouse will be up and I'll be able to move all of the larger seedlings into there.
CHRISTINA STELLA: Without her landlord's permission scaling-up wouldn't be possible.
Cait Caughey has about $60,000 in student loan debt and can't afford farmland. She says that's just one way the loans loom over her life, in agriculture she says land ownership means security. Losing her lease could end her career.
CAIT CAUGHEY: This area where the buildings are, this is probably about 2 acres but just like where all these building.
CHRISTINA STELLA: So this is probably like $20,000 that we're looking at right now.
CAIT CAUGHEY: Way more.
CHRISTINA STELLA: The National Young Farmers Coalition says Katie story is a common one, highlighting some of the biggest challenges facing first generation farmers today - access to land and money. Members have consistently ranked student debt as a top-three barrier to getting both. A 2017 survey by the nonprofit found that more than 80% had college degrees but fewer than half owned all of their land.
Beginning farmers of color can face steeper barriers. Non-white students in the U.S. are more likely to take on more student debt and struggle to repay it. Sarah Campbell at the USDA's National Beginning Farmer and Rancher program says lingering debt can complicate applying for farm loans.
SARAH CAMPBELL: It's certainly a challenge because you're already like carrying debt and then seeking to get into a business that can be very expensive to capitalize.
CHRISTINA STELLA: She helps farmers access federal loans that are meant to be easier to get and pay off than those from private lenders. They have really low interest rates and USDA doesn't use common factors like a credit score to pick who gets money. While student loan debt may not disqualify somebody, she says it can be a hurdle for their business plan.
SARAH CAMPBELL: Folks who are carrying student debt it might be a pretty significant monthly payment, and so they gotta figure out how to come up with that and that will factor into their capacity to repay.
CHRISTINA STELLA: Melanie Kirby who descends from the Tortugas Pueblo tribe in New Mexico says her $100,000 debt and a lack of generational wealth made her feel like she couldn't apply to buy the land she needed to expand her beekeeping business, which she started in 2004.

MELANIE KIRBY: For a long time I almost felt slightly like a failure, that my farm couldn't make more money. And yet we sell out of everything that we produce every single year.
CHRISTINA STELLA: 15 years later, Kirby still doesn't have any retirement savings. Many farmers often sell off their land to fund their retirement. She says for debt strapped farmers especially black indigenous and other people of color the math often feels simple - no land, no assets. No assets, no future in the industry.
SARAH CAMPBELL: They can't even dream or envision or feel that some of those things are within the reach because they're struggling with day-to-day survival. It breaks my heart because we're in our ancestral homeland and yet were displaced.
CHRISTINA STELLA: 98% of U.S. foreign land is owned by white farmers with talk of possibly cancelling some student debt buzzing around Washington, Kirby thinks any loan forgiveness for young farmers would likely help diversify U.S. agriculture.
MELANIE KIRBY: I want to have something that I can offer my children. Whether they wanna stick with it or they can chop it up, and sell it off, and do whatever they want to do but I don't want to hand them crap on a platter. You know what I mean?
CHRISTINA STELLA: She says student loan debt is just one of the many obstacles facing young producers. But with so much land coming up for grabs soon, Kirby says the government is missing an opportunity to invest in the next generation of farmers. Christina Stella, Harvest Public Media.
KAYTE YOUNG: Harvest Public Media reports on food and farming in the Heartland. Find more at HarvestPublicMedia.org.
That's it for our show this week, thanks for tuning in. Be sure to follow Earth Eats on social media, @EarthEats. And subscribe to our YouTube channel. We've got some fun recipe videos from my home kitchen, just search for Earth Eats on YouTube and subscribe.
RENEE REED: The Earth Eats team includes Eobon Binder, Mark Chilla, Toby Foster, Abraham Hill, Payton Knobeloch, Josephine McRobbie, Harvest Public Media and me, Renee Reed. 
KAYTE YOUNG: Special thanks this week to Violet Barron and everyone at the IU Center for Rural Engagement, to Ann and Alan Schertz, and to Ross Gay.
RENEE REED: Our theme music is composed by Erin Tobey and performed by Erin and Matt Tobey. Additional music on the show comes to us from the artist at Universal Productions Music. Earth Eats is produced and edited by Kayte Young and our executive producer is John Bailey.