Comstock's magazine 0919 - September 2019 | Page 47

a year, according to Johnson. Half of
the rice grown in California goes to
the U.S. and Canada; the other half
is exported to Japan — the largest
importer of California rice with 25
percent of the market — and 30 oth-
er countries, including South Korea,
Taiwan and Jordan. Now China, the
largest consumer of rice in the world,
joins that group.
and level the fields, making furrows
for the 175 pounds of seed they plant
per acre. Warehouse workers soak the
rice seeds for 24 hours until they ger-
minate, making them heav y enough
to sink to the bottom when crop dust-
er airplanes drop the seeds in 5 inch-
es of water. Once planted, the rice is
checked twice a day to make sure wa-
ter levels don’t evaporate during the
region’s hot summers. The rice grows
3 feet high with a golden crown of bil-
low y kernels ready to be harvested in
the fall. (Planting this year was de-
layed due to heav y rain in May.) Each
acre yields 4 tons of rice.
“The rice comes up, and the grain
gets heav y, and it tips over and the
FROM FIELDS TO SACKS
Rice was introduced to California
during the gold rush, when Chinese
immigrants arrived as laborers. At-
tempts to grow it in Los Angeles and
Sonoma counties proved futile, but
then farmers discovered it could be
grown in the Sacramento Valley. The
state’s commercial rice industry be-
gan in Biggs in Butte County in 1912,
when U.S. Department of Agriculture
soil specialist W.W. Mackie discovered
medium-grain rice grew well in the
hard soil. Rice fields now provide a
lush green landscape across the valley
during growing season and provide a
home to 5 million birds, including
ducks and geese, and 230 other wild-
life species.
Generations of rice farmers con-
tinue to tend to family crops. On a sun-
ny summer morning, Sean Doherty, a
fifth-generation farmer and owner
of Sean Doherty Farms in Dunnigan
in Yolo County, drives his white Ford
truck across the levees of his fields, in-
specting his crop, passing clusters of
songbirds, red-winged blackbirds and
bitterns. He stops his truck to point to
a f lock of cinnamon teal ducks. “We
get ospreys and eagles,” Doherty says.
“I’ve canoed down the canal with my
daughter, and we’ve seen beavers as
big as Labradors, river otters, minks,
all kinds of animals.”
Doherty and his brothers grew up
on this ranch, working weekends in
the fields and driving trucks at age
9. Now, in the spring, his crews plow
Over fifteen attorneys, hundreds of
satisfied clients, billions of dollars in
successful business transactions
and a mountain of lawsuits
efficiently resolved.
And it all
started five
years ago.
Thank you to our clients and friends who
took the leap with us to start our own firm.
On our fifth anniversary, Chris Delfino, Jennifer Madden,
John O’Malley, Dan Coyle and Jeff Koewler,
join partners Monica Hans Folsom, Corinne Gartner,
Elizabeth Leet Jackson, Shaye Schrick
and our wonderful team of attorneys and staff to
thank each and every one of our friends
who have made our business a success!
delfinomadden.com
September 2019 | comstocksmag.com
47