Celebrating West Side Agriculture 2020

THURSDAY, MARCH 19, 2020 HONORING WEST SIDE AGRICULTURE | 5
Walnuts the heart of Jensen farming, processing operation
GUSTINE - Walnuts
have been a staple crop
spanning generations for
one West Side family.
Today the Jensen family,
which traces its local
agricultural roots back to
the early 1900s, is involved
in not only the walnut production
(as well as some
almonds) but walnut hulling,
processing and marketing
as well.
Today, in addition to the
orchards operated by the
family, a state-of-the-art
huller stands on the family’s
original Jensen Road
ranch outside Gustine and
brothers Kirk and Mark
Jensen own Patterson Nut
Company, where walnuts
are taken for processing.
Kirk oversees orchard
production, the huller operation
and the processing
and marketing side of the
family enterprises at Patterson
Nut, while brother
Mark, who is an attorney,
looks after the business
details.
“We have a good partnership
and combination
of skills. I enjoy the production;
my brother covers
the business aspect,”
Kirk shared. “We would
not be able to do what we
do without the combination
that we have.”
Their father, Wilmar
Jensen, remains active
on the ranch and in the
management side of the
operation, and Kirk’s son
Andrew, who is an independent
pest control advisor,
is also involved in the
business.
Farming ties run deep in
the family, Kirk said.
His great-grandfather
settled on the Jensen Road
ranch in 1904, growing
row crops and raising cattle
and chickens.
His grandfather purchased
an adjacent ranch
off Whitworth Road in the
mid-1930s and planted a
small walnut orchard to
complement the row crops
and livestock.
“My grandfather always
had a small huller,”
Kirk related. “In his time,
you poured walnuts in to
the huller by the sack or
bucket.”
He said the family’s
first serious push into
walnuts came in the late
60s or early 1970s when
Wilmar, who is an attorney,
purchased 80 acres of
additional land adjacent to
the ranches purchased by
the prior generations.
“My dad always loved
farming,” Kirk shared.
“He went through college
at a young age and went
into the service at World
War II. When he came
home farming was at a
standstill. That was when
See JENSEN | PAGE 6
Pictured in the new hulling facility at the Jensen ranch are, from left, Kirk Jensen, Wilmar Jensen, Andrew Jensen and foreman Tyler Lemas.
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