\u201cUnlike a regular job that you go to, where maybe it\u2019s not what you want to be doing, it\u2019s rewarding to have a spiritual and emotional connection to what you\u2019re doing,\u201d Schneider, 36, said of farming. \u201cAnd then it\u2019s also it\u2019s your business, and you\u2019re in charge of it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Schneider and Alem are part of a new wave of LGBTQ farmers who are more visible and better organized than previous generations, with \u201cconvergences\u201d \u2014 or regional grassroots gatherings, support resources such as the Queer Farmer Network<\/a> and farm websites that include the owners\u2019 LGBTQ identities.<\/p>\n The Department of Agriculture\u2019s census of farmers and ranchers doesn\u2019t track gender or sexual orientation, so data is very limited. But enterprising researchers crunched the agriculture census numbers for two-person farms and found that 1.2% of those farmers were in same-sex marriages<\/a>.<\/p>\n That equates to about 24,000 LGBTQ farmers in the U.S. And that number is likely a big undercount because the findings, published in 2020 in the journal Society & Natural Resources, don\u2019t include LGBTQ farmers who aren\u2019t married, aren\u2019t living on two-person farms, aren\u2019t married to the person they farm with or are transgender or gender nonbinary.<\/p>\n The only large U.S. survey<\/a>, by the National Young Farmers Coalition, found that 24% of farmers age 40 and under don\u2019t identify as heterosexual, and 64% say they are not cisgender males.<\/p>\n That survey of 3,300 farmers included participants reached through various organizations, and the findings may not be representative of farming as a whole. Still, the large numbers are in keeping with anecdotal reports from progressive places such as Chicago and Austin, Texas.<\/p>\n \u201cIt feels like there are so many more queer farmers,\u201d said Chicago-area farmer Fresh Roberson, using the younger generations\u2019 preferred term for LGBTQ.<\/p>\n Roberson, who is queer and owns Fresher Together, a collaborative food and farming project in Beaverville, said it\u2019s hard to know if there has been an actual numerical increase, or if queer farmers are just more visible, due to factors such as the rise of the internet.<\/p>\n Either way, Roberson, 42, has noticed a big uptick, even in just the past seven years.<\/p>\n Fresh and Danie Roberson, owners of Fresher Together, on their farming plot at their home in Beaverville, Illinois, July 7, 2025. \u201cI\u2019m a sucker for being a service of my community,\u201d Fresh said. \u201cI get to use my skill to be able to support some folks with basic needs.\u201d (Audrey Richardson\/Chicago Tribune)<\/p>\n<\/li>\n Fresh Roberson plants tomatoes with their partner, Danie Roberson at their farming plot in Beaverville, July 7, 2025. \u201cIt feels magical, connecting with the earth and getting dirty,\u201d Fresh said. \u201cThere\u2019s a piece of me that feels like I can be myself more.\u201d (Audrey Richardson\/Chicago Tribune)<\/p>\n<\/li>\n Fresh coriander on the farming plot of Fresher Together, owned by Fresh and Danie Roberson in Beaverville, July 7, 2025. (Audrey Richardson\/Chicago Tribune)<\/p>\n<\/li>\n Fresh and Danie Roberson clear weeds from their crops at their plot at their home in Beaverville, Illinois, on July 7, 2025. (Audrey Richardson\/Chicago Tribune)<\/p>\n<\/li>\n Danie Roberson plants tomatoes on their farming plot in Beaverville, July 7, 2025. (Audrey Richardson\/Chicago Tribune)<\/p>\n<\/li>\n Danie Roberson holds an eggplant flower on their farming plot at their home in Beaverville, July 7, 2025. (Audrey Richardson\/Chicago Tribune)<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n Show Caption<\/p>\n 1 of 6<\/p>\n Fresh and Danie Roberson, owners of Fresher Together, on their farming plot at their home in Beaverville, Illinois, July 7, 2025. \u201cI\u2019m a sucker for being a service of my community,\u201d Fresh said. \u201cI get to use my skill to be able to support some folks with basic needs.\u201d (Audrey Richardson\/Chicago Tribune)<\/p>\n Expand<\/a> Queer farmers \u2014 and young farmers in general \u2014 often don\u2019t come from established farm families that pass down big plots of land from generation to generation.<\/p>\n Instead, they discover farming on their own, while navigating an industry that tends to be white, male and socially conservative. The American Farm Bureau, for instance, still defines family to include only blood relationships, legal adoption and \u201cmarriage between male and female.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n Schneider and Alem were already interested in sustainably grown food and how to make it accessible to more people when Schneider began their farm training program.<\/p>\n In addition, both had childhood experiences at their grandparents\u2019 hobby farms: Schneider\u2019s grandfather had a horse ranch and vegetable farm in Michigan, and Alem\u2019s grandmother grew corn, tomatoes and cucumbers in Louisiana.<\/p>\n \u201cWe have the same passion for growing food and being outside, and the importance of getting in the dirt and connecting to the earth,\u201d Alem said.<\/p>\n Schneider\u2019s training at the Botanic Garden\u2019s Windy City Harvest apprenticeship program<\/a> played a big role in their journey, allowing Schneider to get hands-on work experience.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was cool through the apprenticeship to see a couple of rounds of produce that I had either grown or our class had grown from start to finish,\u201d Schneider said. \u201cIt just always seemed (that) to operate that way, you needed a big team, you needed to have all these tools, and you had to have all this space. (But) you can actually do this with less space and you don\u2019t need all the tools and resources.\u201d<\/p>\n Scheider and Alem never thought they would be able to own a farm \u2014 the financial hurdles were just too great. But Schneider had a knack for the work, and was drawn to the idea of running their own business.<\/p>\n The couple both took a business class after Schneider\u2019s apprenticeship \u2014 and then took the leap to farming at Windy City\u2019s incubator farm in Bronzeville. Their farm, Otter Oaks, is named for Schneider\u2019s grandfather\u2019s ranch.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s been a learning process every year,\u201d Alem said with a laugh.<\/p>\n \u201cWe don\u2019t have employees. We\u2019re doing the labor, on top of running the business, and on top of having other jobs,\u201d Schneider said.<\/p>\n \u201cFortunately, Windy City has so many resources that have allowed us to figure all this out \u2014 inch by inch,\u201d Alem said.<\/p>\n Roberson, who grew up in North Carolina and came to Chicago to attend college, also had family roots in farming: maternal grandparents who were sharecroppers growing tobacco, cotton and peanuts.<\/p>\n \u201cI often say I feel like there is something ancestral that is calling me back to the land, that I don\u2019t quite understand,\u201d said Roberson, who uses they\/them and she\/her pronouns.<\/p>\n Growing up in a small town surrounded by farmland, Roberson said they had access to sweet potatoes harvested from a local field, and greens bought from a truck that would pull up in a parking lot.<\/p>\n There were many steps on their long road from studying engineering and physics at Northwestern University, to culinary school, to full-time farming, but a big moment came when Roberson was a first-year college student.<\/p>\n Roberson went to the store to buy pecans for pecan pie, but couldn\u2019t afford them.<\/p>\n \u201cI was like, \u2018What?\u2019\u201d they said. Back home, their aunt had a pecan tree next to her house. \u201cI didn\u2019t realize how expensive this thing was \u2014 or how inaccessible.\u201d<\/p>\n As a chef Roberson made sure that they worked at restaurants where they could afford to eat, and today their customers include a local food bank.<\/p>\n Targeted by Trump Farming is a tough business, with many farmers in the Young Farmers survey reporting barriers such as lack of access to land or capital and high health care costs.<\/p>\n And LGBTQ people can face additional problems, including discrimination and social isolation, research indicates<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n
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![\"Fresh](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/CTC-L-LGBTQ-farming045_231254050.jpg\")
\n![\"Fresh](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/CTC-L-LGBTQ-farming013_231254036.jpg\")
\n![\"Fresh](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/CTC-L-LGBTQ-farming016_231254086.jpg\")
\n![\"Danie](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/CTC-L-LGBTQ-farming044_231254048.jpg\")
\n![\"Danie](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/CTC-L-LGBTQ-farming024_231254092.jpg\")
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\nMaking the leap<\/p>\n
\n![\"Weeds](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/CTC-L-LGBTQ-farming095_231254450.jpg\")
Weeds cover the calves of Jarvi Schneider as they work on retying a weed whacker during sunset at one of Otter Oaks Farm’s plots in Chicago on July 3, 2025. (Audrey Richardson\/Chicago Tribune)<\/p>\n
![\"Fresh](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/1754383571_785_CTC-L-LGBTQ-farming016_231254086.jpg\")
Fresh and Danie Roberson clear weeds from their crops at their plot at their home in Beaverville, Illinois, on July 7, 2025. (Audrey Richardson\/Chicago Tribune)<\/p>\n