[Ocean Sounds] Jose: I love it.

I love farming.

Thats my thing in my blood.

I guess.

I don't know.

I guess it might -- its what I like.

Narr: Talk to Jose Ramirez and you learn right away just how much he loves working the land and just how proud and grateful he is to be able to farm about 90 acres in Pescadero on California's Central Coast, just a short distance from the restless Pacific Ocean.

Jose: It's a real small town, quiet community, soil is beautiful, its rich, nice soil we got here in Pescadero.

Narr: Today, Jose and his team are harvesting rosemary, A hardy and fragrant herb.

Also being pictured a green kale.

The farm also grows pumpkins, peas, beans and berries, which visitors are welcome to pick while visiting the farm store run by Jose and his wife, Claudia.

Much of their other produce goes to local restaurants, suppliers or retailers.

Jose: Rosemary, we harvest every day Its the one it sells every day.

It gives you money every day.

It's not a lot, but it helps for the other stuff.

Narr: Jose will tell you his journey to becoming a farmer is the embodiment of the American dream.

At age 15 and alone, Jose immigrated from Mexico to California to live with an uncle and older brother.

He found work with a local flower and vegetable grower and spent the next 20 years learning the business, eventually becoming farm foreman.

Jose saw it as his chance to learn all he could about agriculture.

Narr: Everybody has the opportunity.

You just don't want to take it.

It's up to you.

Narr: Over time, financial necessity compelled Jose to take a full time job at the local school district.

He still farmed a single acre, but after ten years, his enduring love of the land compelled him to try to return to it in a bigger way.

Narr: I was working too much time at the school and not enough time in my farm.

So I said, What would be better?

Quit... Quit the school or quit farming?

I have to do one of the two.

So I decide quit school and go to farming.

Narr: For Jose, that decision and that opportunity came through Peninsula Open Space Trust, a nonprofit dedicated to preserving open space across Northern California from forests to farmland.

Nearly half the farm acreage here in San Mateo County has been lost to development or private non-farm ownership.

In 2012, POST bought a 900 acre farm and is leasing part of it to Jose.

They've also helped to make improvements like new irrigation systems and even restoring this farmhouse now doubling as a produce store.

Dan Olstein, POST director of land Stewardship, says Jose is exactly the kind of farmer they seek.

Dan: He's so dedicated to what he... what he does.

He's an incredible farmer.

He's got great instincts on the land and it's been great to see that blossom, uh, under our ownership.

And, you know, the goal is for him to own that farm.

Jose: If it wasn't for them I would've never got the chance.

Dan: There's an incredible amount of interest from different folks, from different backgrounds who... who grew up farming.

Our hope is that we can find opportunities to help those folks own their own farms or their own farm businesses.

Claudia: This side is raspberry and this side in the corner, is blackberry.

Customer: Oh, down there?

Claudia: Yeah.

OK.

Thank you.

Customer: OK, thank you so much, Narr: For now, Jose says he's satisfied working each day, harvesting the bounty from this rich soil.

Building a legacy for the next generation and perhaps providing hope to others who share his dream of coming from modest means to join the ranks of America's farmers providing healthy food to the nation and the world.

Jose: I think I got more of what I deserved because my main thing was my family and I still say my family.

I'm not saying that we... were rich, but we're not poor and we've been happy.

We have a good life, really good life.

We got.