Daniel Shuman, Irrigation Crew
Daniel Shuman is a native Western Washingtonian, born in Edmonds and raised in Lynnwood. When he married his lovely wife Karina, also from Washington, they decided to spend some time in Hawaii to experience a new place and see if they wanted to live there. After two years, they missed the seasons and the variety of landscapes that can be found in the Evergreen State so much that they came back home, and have been here ever since.
It was Daniel’s older brother who challenged him to start eating quality food, mainly because of flavor. “I actually started working on farms because I thought organic food tasted better,” he says. “Then I wanted to grow my own food, and one thing led to another, until Karina and I purchased our own acre in Agnew where we have our own garden and we raise animals.” They now have four ducks, ten chickens, four milk goats, and sixteen rabbits!
Daniel has come to help with custom pig and chicken slaughters on the farm in order to learn how to do it so that he can process his own meat. “I want my kids to know where their food comes from,” he states. He and Karina have a two-year-old son, Leo, and baby daughter River. “We knew nothing when we started,” Daniel laughs. “We’re lucky we also have Nash’s farm. Our children are eating so much better than we did growing up.”
Daniel is one-half of the irrigation crew this season. He and Gabe Mills are the ones responsible for moving pipe, maintaining the pumps, fixing leaks, and tracking where and when to irrigate, a more difficult task this year due to the drought. When he’s not doing that, Daniel also works packing, weeding, greenhouse and harvesting. Despite the hard work, he likes what he’s doing. “It’s been a blessing for us to work on a family farm with such great people.” The farm is grateful to have him on board, too!