Matt grew up in the suburbs of Albuquerque, New Mexico, but he became a farmer in Iraq.
Matt, Lily and cornfield
“Rather than thinking of Iraq as the place where my heart was broken and my mind was controlled I prefer to think of Iraq as the place where I discovered the key to my freedom. I prefer to remember the trucks full of watermelons and pomegranates that would pass through our checkpoints. I felt strangely human as I waved cars by with pomegranate seeds stuck to my Kevlar vest.
“I first learned the value of sustainability and the resilience of agricultural communities while serving as an Infantryman in Iraq. In the middle of the chaos of a regime change and a damaged infrastructure the farmers kept growing and kept selling. Seeing this strength is what made me want to be a farmer.”
After Matt’s tour in Iraq, he attended the Center for Agro-ecology and Sustainable Food Systems at UC Santa Cruz, where he met Lily Schneider. When he finished his program in Santa Cruz, Matt volunteered for the Peace Corps and worked as an agricultural extension agent in Niger, West Africa. He then spent a year growing gourmet vegetables in Sebastopol.
Lily Schneider grew up in Berkeley, California with a garden in her backyard. She attended UC Santa Cruz and got her BA in Environmental Studies. In her last year, she spent a semester in Chile studying agronomy. Upon completion of her degree, she returned to California where she worked for several well known farms like Tierra Vegetables and The Apple Farm, learning more about sustainable agriculture along the way. Now she lives and farms in the Suisun Valley where there is good soil, clean water and a supportive community.
Together Matt and Lily are the owners and operators of Shooting Star CSA, a new eight-acre organic diversified vegetable farm. Working side-by-side, they grow over 35 different crops including strawberries, heirloom tomatoes, sweet peppers, potatoes, melons, basil, cucumbers and sugar snap peas.
CSA stands for Community Supported Agriculture. CSAs are partnerships between the local community and the farmer, with members purchasing shares in local farms, paying in advance and thus providing farms with a money up front and stable income. In return, members receive weekly boxes of their freshest, tastiest produce, delivered to their neighborhood. Boxes usually contain between six and nine different vegetables. The Shooting Star season runs for 25 weeks: June through November.
Finding the perfect combination of soil, water and climate was a long search, but McCue and Schneider are ecstatic to have settled into the stunningly beautiful Suisun Valley, just 40 minutes east of Berkeley. Matt and Lily recently employed another young veteran and have two active military people volunteering on their farm from the nearby air base.
