Santa Rosa Sunrise Rotary Club's Animal House!
In no particular order; Jennifer Adams, Luis Esquivel, Penny Millar, Paul O’Rear, Dick & Ellen Perman, Steve and Kathleen Amend, Leroy Carlenzoli, Max Childs, Rob & Betsy Sanville, Stacy Drucker-Andress & Kevin, Olin Leasher, Steve Zwick, Susan Glowacki, Del Raby, Matthew Crooks, Shauna & Dave Lorenzen and Linda and Dick Dondanville (the Amend's neighbors who suggested we invite Nate to present at our meeting).
Saturday morning 23 Sunrise Rotarians, friends and family had a very enjoyable learning and volunteer experience at Forget-Me-Not Farm in Sebastopol. Director of Operations Nate Rathmann talked a little bit about the work of the Farm with children who have experienced abuse, and how therapy with animals (many of which had been abused or abandoned themselves) and work in the vegetable garden helps their recovery. The group was then introduced to each animal and its background story, and asked to help out with the very important task of acting as a “human wall” to move all the animals from stalls to their food (they knew exactly where the food was and weren’t going anywhere else, but we felt important………..). For the next hour and a half the group embodied “the leverage of Rotary” by clearing the area around a new hot house, laying down weed cloth and hauling in chipped gravel for groundcover, “up-potting” vegetable starts to 4-inch containers and clearing out several rows of severely over-weeded garden beds. The morning concluded by joining the animals- goats, cows, horses, llamas and sheep- in the pasture for some “Rotary bonding time”.
First order was to meet the barn animals and let them out to pasture.
Time to get to work! Our assignment was to clear the weeds around the greenhouse that The Hammer, Leroy, and crew help build to lay a weed barrier and to weed the garden beds.
After accomplishing our goal, we were all let out to pasture to spend quality time with the animals.
Forget Me Not Farm is a therapeutic haven for traumatized children and animals (and Rotarians)!
