Since he was 13, Ben Schiner has lived on Wagon Wheel Ranch in Mt. Airy, MD. For nearly 15 years, he has worked the land, but this summer—his last on the farm—was special as he built something filled with beauty. Schiner gained knowledge and patience as he created a new garden space by building a greenhouse from recycled material, and became his own boss during his internship this summer.
Schiner, a second-year IAA student majoring in Sustainable Agriculture at the Institute of Applied Agriculture, used his internship as an opportunity to build a greenhouse from recycled material and turn a half-acre overgrown pen into a beautiful garden. Throughout the summer, Ben donated most of the produce harvested to various local food banks.
Schiner began this large project in March because he “wanted to take an overgrown field and give it a beneficial purpose,” he said. He had a large open space that he thought would look better with a greenhouse. Using available resources around the farm, Schiner set out to build a greenhouse. He built the garden to coincide with the greenhouse. He planted various seeds, knowing that he could harvest produce every week to donate to food banks which was the big driver for the project. COVID-19 hit extremely hard, and people stopped working; Schiner was able to provide fresh food for people in need when times were hard.
The internship helped Schiner organize and reflect on his land-use gain managerial experience. He recruited a fellow classmate, Willis Deitemyer to help. Deitemyer said, “Ben was flexible as a boss and always worked to enjoy himself and have fun while still getting work done.” Reaching their end goal--to have a larger, nicer greenhouse or a set of greenhouses—required coordinating their schedules around planting and harvesting.
The moment that stood out for Schiner this summer was when the flowers started to bloom. He had assumed all of the flowers would all be similar, but as they bloomed, he realized that they were not ordinary seasonal flowers. He described them as “crazy coral magic flowers.” This exciting event definitely made this summer special. Schiner’s many experiences over the summer allowed for personal growth in farming, self-teaching, teaching others, and construction management, in addition to the growth that came about after the greenhouse was built. This was a summer that Schiner will always remember.
