James Patterson standing and giving an interview appears. Text on the bottom left reads, James Patterson. Natural resources SAE. Grand Canyon FFA, Wellsboro, PA. James looks at the Christmas trees in his Christmas tree farm and removes some leaves from it. He holds a cutter in his hand. Back-to-back clips of Christmas trees in different areas in the farm appear.
My name is James Patterson, and I go to Wellsboro Area School District. For my SAE, I help my dad and grandpa plant Christmas trees, cut Christmas trees, shear ’em, get into a nice Christmas tree shape, you know, more of like all way round cone. And then, in the fall, I help take the trees down to auction in Buffalo Valley produce auction. So, our most popular type of tree here is our balsam fir. It’s just because we have that the most, and people, they usually just go toward it because it has strong branch for Christmas ornaments, and needles aren’t prickly like some spruces.
James gets inside his farm vehicle and drives it. Clips of James driving his farm vehicle on the farm appear. Later, a tractor appears, followed by James giving an interview.
What I like best about this SAE is it’s just fun. It’s, you know, I’ve had plenty of fun doing this. I’ll go to Nationals, or I’ll go to state convention. And it’s like, ”Oh, so what do you do for your SAE?” ”Oh, I’m a Christmas tree farmer,” and you’re like, ”Oh, really? That’s cool. I’ve never heard of that.” It’s like yeah, it’s very fun. It’s, you know, a lot, a lot of people do it. But it’s I still think like, not all of them are the same because you’re gonna have the oddball ones out there like me.
James drives his farm vehicle in the field cutting the plant growth. Later, he starts a tractor followed by which a view of the top of the Christmas tree appears.
This summer, since we want to cut down trees and get the field ready for, you know, years to come, these fields up here, we got are all grown up to, you know, waist trees almost. And it’s like, I’m going to cut those out, give the land a couple of years, turn it up, so, you know, we get nutrients going back through there. Then we’ll plant—we’ll go plant there in maybe two or three years.
What I want to do following high school is, I’m actually looking at going to a truck driving school, and following that, I’d like to find a job somewhere relatively close to here so I can keep doing the Christmas tree farm.
A small plant on the farm appears. Later, James digs in the soil and plants a small Christmas tree.
The advice I would give a student just starting in FFA? I’d tell them don’t be afraid; once you get that ball rolling, it’s not gonna stop until you graduate. And even after you graduate, that ball is still gonna be rolling because you never know how your SAE, or these classes, are going to affect you later on.
The visual of James removing some leaves from the Christmas trees on the Christmas tree farm reappears. Then, he looks at some leaves of some Christmas trees around him and walks away.
I mean, for me, it’s affected me greatly because it’s given me the officer opportunity for this past year and next year. And it’s given me a lot of new experiences. It’s given me leadership skills, public speaking, and, you know, public appearance skills, and even this right here, this video; it’s allowed me to get great experiences like this.