In collaboration with the Santa Rosa Junior College Foundation, we’ve established the Pine Cone Foundation Internship Program at Shone Farm. Our current endowment allows for three interns to be hired, and paid a living wage, each semester to learn and acquire farming and animal husbandry experience while they earn their degrees. The farm provides students with hands-on immersion that cannot be duplicated in the classroom and is assisting future generations with gaining the skills they need to run, manage or found their own farms and ranches.
The Ecological Agriculture Center at Shone Farm is a 196-acre area (100-acres of pasture land, 80-acres of vineyards, 12-acres of crop production, and 4-acres of orchards). The farm provides Santa Rosa Junior College’s students with experiential farming experiences and sustainable and organic research opportunities. It is located about 12 miles from the Santa Rosa Campus, in the heart of the Russian River Valley. It was named in honor of Robert Shone, an active leader in Sonoma County agriculture, a Santa Rosa Junior College trustee and the President of the Sonoma County Farm Bureau. Shone Farm has been ranked by Online College Plan as the #1 college farm in the Nation (out of 60), surpassing Cal Poly, UC Davis, Iowa State, UC Santa Cruz, and such Ivy League institutions as Stanford, Vassar, Dartmouth, and Cornell.
In partnership with the United Anglers of Casa Grande, we’ve initiated an endowment that directly supports the operations of their state-of-the-art conservation fish hatchery on the Casa Grande High School campus in Petaluma. Our annual contribution aids with increased operating costs due to the recovery of federally threatened coho salmon throughout California. In 2021, UACG was instrumental to the survival and recovery of 4,000 endangered salmon from Warm Springs Hatchery in Sonoma County and 80,000 Coho Eggs from King Fisher Flat in Santa Cruz. We’ve also established the Pine Cone Foundation College Scholarship Fund specifically for the UA club leadership, which is comprised of students enrolled at CGHS aiming to pursue higher education in wildlife, fish, and nature conservation.
United Anglers of Casa Grande is a non-profit organization whose purpose is to promote environmental awareness and activism through hands-on habitat restoration that supports the survival and recovery of federally threatened trout and salmon species. Casa Grande High School students operate and maintain the fish hatchery on the campus with the oversight of Dan Hubacker, a science teacher and United Anglers alumni. Each participant learns a range of relevant skills through practical application and an intensive environmental preservation curriculum. While the group usually raises steelhead trout native to the local watershed, with these unprecedented years of drought and fire, the school program is pivoting to manage federally endangered species with nowhere else to go. This award-winning, internationally recognized program is funded solely through community donations, as well as grants from corporate sponsors and foundations.