I'm Andy and I run Grow Eco Farm, a regenerative mixed vegetable operation in Ramona, CA. The project began in 2019 on a quarter acre in the South Bay area of San Diego with the aim of providing healthy, chemical-free food for the local community in a way that would rehabilitate soils and ecosystems destroyed by decades of conventional agriculture. Things were going pretty well until we experienced two years of exceptionally high rainfall, flooding out the farm entirely in January 2023 and 2024. After the second year in a row of losing everything, I took the gamble to relocate the operation to another part of the county, which is how we ended up in Ramona. It cost nearly everything to make the move, and we were counting on a bumper first year to stay in business, but unfortunately, we ran up against the driest start to a winter in California history and some of the most ferocious Santa Ana winds the area has experienced in years. We've lost thousands of dollars in fencing and protective frost cover, and as much as fifty percent of our crop, which has either been buried by drifting soil or dried to a crisp by the winds.

I hate to have to ask for this kind of help, but after three years in a row of crushing weather whiplash, it's hard to see a way through this winter without the funds to replace our recent losses.