{"id":201899,"date":"2026-03-23T01:40:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-23T01:40:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/201899\/"},"modified":"2026-03-23T01:40:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-23T01:40:08","slug":"tampa-bay-area-farmer-shares-her-experience-in-the-industry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/201899\/","title":{"rendered":"Tampa Bay area farmer shares her experience in the industry"},"content":{"rendered":"

DUETTE, Fla. \u2014\u00a0More than 1.2 million agricultural producers in the U.S. are women<\/a>, according to the latest Census of Agriculture. For one local farmer, the journey into farming started from scratch, and now, she\u2019s part of a growing community of women making their mark in the industry.<\/p>\n

What You Need To Know<\/p>\n

Queen\u2019s Ranch<\/a> opened two years ago with the purpose of establishing an animal rescue. It’s now also transformed into a farm
\nThe latest Agricultural Census reports<\/a>\u00a0that 1.2 million female farm producers are accounted for in the U.S.
\nQueen\u2019s Ranch is growing a variety of plants, fruits and vegetables in Duette<\/p>\n

Unlike some farmers, Pia Ceccarelli Rosenberg likes to give her plants a pep talk. Watching her crops thrive is something she treasures, especially because farming was never part of her plan.<\/p>\n

\u201cI never had a green thumb, never. Everything would die on me,\u201d she said<\/p>\n

Rosenberg\u00a0now owns five acres, known as Queen\u2019s Ranch in Duette.\u00a0<\/p>\n

She bought the property two years ago with the goal of starting an animal rescue, but first, she needed a way to generate income.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s how she found farming and she says it\u2019s been a learning experience ever since.<\/p>\n

“What\u2019s going to go where, what can grow here, what kind of plants can I afford to understand,” Rosenberg said.<\/p>\n

Today, her farm is home to more than 3,000 fruits and vegetables and she runs it largely on her own.<\/p>\n

The latest Census of Agriculture shows more than half of all U.S. farms have at least one female producer.<\/p>\n

Bridget Stice with the Polk County UF\/IFAS Extension Office says while they\u2019re not seeing a large increase in female farmers locally, women have always played a role in the industry, and their leadership is becoming more visible.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re seeing more of women coming to the forefront, not that it changes whether they were working hard before,\u201d says Stice.<\/p>\n

And like many farmers,\u00a0Rosenberg has already had to learn how to adapt to challenges like Florida\u2019s unpredictable weather.<\/p>\n

Cold weather recently damaged part of her crops, but it hasn\u2019t stopped her from moving forward.\u00a0Rosenberg hopes her story will encourage other women to consider farming as well.<\/p>\n

\u201cI had no idea that this could be a part of my daily life. It\u2019s a matter of just exposing them and giving them a chance to come and see and understand that this is something that can be done,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

What started as a plan for an animal rescue has grown into a farm as well, and a new purpose.<\/p>\n

Rosenberg\u00a0also plans to\u00a0host a sunflower harvest event this summer, hoping to give more people a chance to experience farm life firsthand.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"DUETTE, Fla. \u2014\u00a0More than 1.2 million agricultural producers in the U.S. are women, according to the latest Census…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":201900,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[3204,68229,1011,274,1190,2200,6076,7088,115,135,137,136,278,2032,835,53989],"class_list":["post-201899","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tampa","tag-agriculture","tag-app-agriculture","tag-app-human-interest","tag-app-top-stories","tag-human-interest","tag-instagram-bn9","tag-lizbeth-gutierrez","tag-manatee-county","tag-news","tag-tampa","tag-tampa-headlines","tag-tampa-news","tag-top-stories","tag-trending-topics","tag-vod","tag-womens-history"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201899","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=201899"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201899\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/201900"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=201899"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=201899"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=201899"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}