Friday, July 1, 2022
CapitalPress.com 11
Women in Ag
‘A really good education’ A passion for animals
By BRENNA WIEGAND
For the Capital Press
SILVERTON, Ore. —
Herman Goschie always
thought no daughter of his
would be a farmer.
Much to his surprise,
daughter Gayle just couldn’t
stay away. Her determina-
tion has made her a pioneer
as a woman in agriculture.
“When I came back to
the farm, my dad could see
that I was serious,” Goschie
said. “I was fi rst relegated
to managing hand labor
out in the fi eld, which was
crazy because our employ-
ees had much more expe-
rience than I did, but the
crews had patience, and,
as a very young person, I
was given an understanding
as to all the work that goes
into bringing in a crop.”
Goschie tagged along
with her dad to industry
meetings and hop commis-
By BRIAN WALKER
For the Capital Press
Gayle Goschie
Brenna Wiegand/For the Capital Press
Gayle Goschie surveys a springtime hop fi eld. Goschie
is the fourth generation on the family farm that plant-
ed some of the Willamette Valley’s fi rst hops in 1904.
sion meetings and listened
to the talk of other growers.
“It was a really good
education,” Goschie said.
“There were very few peo-
ple my age doing that at
the time. I stayed involved
in the hop commission,
became a commissioner
and ended up representing
Oregon on the international
Hop Research Council.”
The Goschie family
planted and harvested its
fi rst hops in 1904, when
it was about the only cash
crop
around.
Nestled
against the hills of Silverton
in Oregon’s beautiful Wil-
lamette Valley, the family
farm remains a fi xture in the
local growing community.
COLVILLE, Wash. —
Angie Barton was always
drawn to animals while grow-
ing up in Vancouver, Wash.
Her mother gave her a
pony when she was 8 and a
horse at 14.
“I grew up with stories of
my mom’s sheep ranch and
homesteading,” Barton said.
Her interest in animals
deepened when she learned
about a nearby dairy.
“I spent my spare time
exploring the old barn and
eventually got a job feeding
the heifers that were raised
there,” said Barton, who owns
Douglas Falls Creamery and
Barton Hay near Colville,
Wash., with her husband,
Dennis.
By the time Barton moved
out at 18 to be the garden-
er-caretaker at the estate and
dairy across the road, she
Angie Barton
Angie Barton’s love for animals is evident at Douglas
Falls Creamery and Barton Hay near Colville, Wash.
had a dog, two horses, two
ponies, two goats, chickens
and rabbits.
“I was allowed to keep my
animals at the old barn and
eventually I began working at
the main dairy as scraper and
then relief feeder,” she said.
“I was fascinated by the pro-
cess of dairying, helped with
a lot of diff erent aspects and
learned a lot.”
Technical services manager
A love of being in the vineyard
By BRENNA WIEGAND
For the Capital Press
By BRENNA WIEGAND
For the Capital Press
NEWBERG, Ore. —
Anne Iskra’s graduate the-
sis at Oregon State Uni-
versity includes valuable
information she uses to this
day.
A large part of her job as
technical services manager
at Marion Ag Service is
helping growers of all crops
manage the impact of pests
and diseases.
Though her family
raised sweet cherries in the
Columbia Gorge area, Iskra
never thought she would
return to agriculture as a
career. That is, until she got
a job with Dave Gent, a
plant pathologist with the
USDA in Corvallis, who
primarily works on hops.
“That turned into a grad-
uate degree and every-
thing kind of unfolded from
there,” Iskra said.
Anne Iskra
Brenna Wiegand/For the Capital Press
Anne Iskra visits a hop fi eld as part of her work with
Marion Ag Service. Iskra relied on such growers for
support as she completed her master’s degree at Ore-
gon State University.
Her graduate work
looked at the rates and tim-
ing of nitrogen applications
on hops and its impact on
foliar disease, insect pest
populations and brewing
quality.
A portion of her work
involved studying the bio-
logical control of spider
mites in hops. They were
able to document the sta-
bility of the natural pred-
ator population and how
quickly it returns after
disruption.
It’s about small-scale woodlands
By CRAIG REED
For the Capital Press
OAKLAND, Ore. —
Tami Jo Braz is not only
a small woodland owner,
but also an ambassador for
those who grow and man-
age trees on small parcels
of land.
Braz and her husband,
Barry Braz, have owned
and managed 50 acres of
woodlands since 1986.
After taking Master Wood-
land classes and with help
from a forester, the work the
couple did on their property
earned them the 2004 Tree
Farmer of the Year award for
the Douglas County Small
Woodlands Association.
In 2016, Tami Jo Braz
joined the association’s
board and soon became the
secretary and membership
coordinator for the organiza-
tion, which has 225 member
families. Braz writes a regu-
lar newsletter that includes a
Tami Jo Braz
Craig Reed/For the Capital Press
ciation. “I want to encour-
age others to be good stew-
ards of what they’ve been
entrusted with.
“Being a member of the
association allows you to be
in some great company,” she
added. “People who love
their land have so much in
common.”
Danielle Zarro keeps a close eye on everything happen-
ing on Adelsheim Vineyard’s 157 producing acres. The
assistant vineyard manager says she appreciates the
mentoring she has received from women in the fi eld.
viticulture and enology and
headed West.”
Her schooling at OSU
included a job in the sensory
lab with Elizabeth Tomasino,
who proved to be an inspiring
female mentor.
Upon graduation, Zarro
secured an internship with
Gallo, which in turn led to her
current job as assistant vine-
yard manager for Adelsheim
Vineyards
under
Kelli
Gregory.
“These last fi ve years have
been just incredible,” she
said. “I really love being in
the vineyard working with the
vines and being outside and
working with the crew.”
More than a ‘hobby gone wrong’
By CRAIG REED
For the Capital Press
Tami Jo Braz is the co-owner of 50 acres of small wood-
lands in Douglas County, Ore. She is also a board mem-
ber, secretary and membership coordinator for the
Douglas County Small Woodlands Association.
profi le on one of the mem-
bers and the management of
their land.
“It’s a matter of giving
back and working to further
the education of those who
want to be good stewards of
their land,” Braz said of tak-
ing on a leadership role for
the Small Woodlands Asso-
NEWBERG, Ore. —
Danielle Zarro grew up in
Florida, about as far from
Oregon agriculture as you
can get.
“I grew up as an absolute
beach bum,” Zarro said. “It
took some time to fi gure out
what I really wanted to do,
but I settled on horticulture
and started looking for online
schools with really good pro-
grams because I wasn’t quite
ready to leave Florida.”
She was quickly drawn
to Oregon State University
where intro classes included a
survey of related careers.
“In one of those lectures
Patty Skinkis explained how
vineyard management is
shifting to refl ect changes in
climate and I was absolutely
smitten with the idea of man-
aging vineyards,” Zarro said.
“I switched my degree to
Danielle Zarro
ROSEBURG, Ore. —
With a wide smile and laugh-
ter, Ellie Norris-Assmus calls
Norris Blueberry Farm “a
hobby gone wrong.”
The hobby that Paul and
Sandy Norris started by plant-
ing 5 acres of blueberries in
the mid-1980s to keep their
three daughters and friends
busy is now 650 acres of blue-
berry bushes and a packing
house with six sorting lines
and six packing lines.
During their junior high,
high school and college years,
Norris daughters Amy, Carrie
and Ellie worked in the slowly
expanding blueberry fi eld that
their parents had started and
sold the fruit at a roadside
stand and at a local farmers
market. Now at 40 years old,
Norris-Assmus is a full-time
employee of the business and
43-year-old Carrie Norris is a
half-time employee.
Carrie Norris
Ellie Norris-Assmus
Craig Reed/For the Capital Press
Sisters Carrie Norris, left, and Ellie Norris-Assmus have
returned to the blueberry farm they grew up on and now
share the responsibilities of running the Norris Blueber-
ry Farm’s packing house during the harvest season.
While Paul and Sandy are
still frequently on site, the two
sisters have gradually taken
over the operation of the farm
with the help of 10 full-time
employees and seasonal local
workers and contract crews.
“They’re running the
farm,” Paul Norris said of
his daughters. “It makes me
very proud to watch them
develop the operation. It’s fun
to watch them move the farm
forward.”
The daughters said their
parents and the farm taught
them to work hard and to real-
ize there are usually no quick
answers to problems that
unexpectedly arise.