UC Cooperative Extension, Placer County, CA: Wayne Vinyard

  Wayne Vinyard; You may be wondering where the winery photos are. I had a bit of confusion when I was setting up this part of the assignment. I was trying to locate "Wayne Vinyard" on a map given to me of all the agricultural locations I was to shoot over the course of several days. After scanning the map several times I finally made a phone call and found the problem. Wayne Vinyard is the farmers name and his crop is rice! 

 This was a pretty cool day in the field. After a winding crazy drive in an area covered by fields of one crop or another and following directions such as " turn left at the largest silo at the end of the longest straightaway" I somehow ended up at the right location. 

 Within minutes of meeting Wayne I was riding along side him in his rice harvester. It was amazing to see how easily the tall fields of rice were cut down and the individual grains of rice harvested in one quick and decisive turn of the harvesters blades. I learned a lot that day as I watched Wayne and his family- there are three generations at work in the field- harvest their crop. As it always seems when I'm dealing with people who work the land, the Vinyard family had an obvious love for what they were doing. It makes me envious of the dedication to one important way of life chosen so long ago. Then again, it makes me feel damn lucky to be a photographer who gets to experience small portions of these lives and share those experiences with others.