Gallery – Made by Mother Earth NON PROFIT

Northern California visiting Tribal members come to Nüümü territory volunteer

Beloved Community elder and youth volunteer farming

Farming mentor and Advisor loads compost from his compost pile for the farms

Nüümü tribal member on tractor clearing commuity garden

Mentor and Advisor shows how to instal irrigation

Nüümü Tribal memebrs receive plants donated at 10,000 plant giveaway

Nüümü Mentor and owner of Warlie Farms North Paha Farm chooses his first year crops

Nüümü tribal members receiving plants at the at plant give away

Local retired fire chief and local nurse receiving plants at the at plant give away

Big Pine Food Sovereignty Director (now Bishop Paiute Tribal FSP director) recieves plants for Nüümü tribal members at the plant giveaway

Nüümü Mentor and owner of Warlie Farms chooses his first year crops for the North Paha Farm

Community Garden BPT after community planting is complete

Warlie Farms behind the casion on BPT Reservation

White Mt. Buffalo Ranch owner w/ plants (a Luiseño Band of Indians,
Payomkawichum farm)

2end year of plant give away at Warlie Farms on North Paha behind the tribal casino

Native Permaculture courses on BPT reservation

Nüümü Mentor owner of S Paha Farm gathers cattail

Gathering donations to the Nüümü Elders at Apple Hill Ranch

Executive Director tills the community garden between writing grants

Nüümü Permaculture courses on the BPT reservation

Community youth volunteer for Food Sovereignty

Beloved elder receiving plants at the plant giveaway

Community members receiving plants at the at plant give away

Nüümü/Diné tribal members at plant give away

Food Sovereignty Team of Nüümü/Indigenous Mexican tribal members, community members. Permaculture professor at the Permaculture course, and 10,000 plant give-away

Nüümü tribal members at 10,000 plant give away

Beloved Yosemite Tribal Elder of Southern Sierra Tribal Nation & Permaculture Teacher gifts bison from White Mtn Ranch

Nüümü tribal members at Permaculture course

Nüümü tribal members at 10,000 plant give away

Nurturing Organic Food Sovereignty

Explore our impactful initiatives advancing food security, wild horse ecology awareness, and land stewardship.

Wild Horse Habitat Restoration

Ecology Renewal

Community Seed Saving

Organic Heritage Gardens

Land Protection Efforts

Preserving Sacred Spaces

Earth-Based Skills Workshops

Traditional Craft Revivals

Wild Horse Equine Therapy

Equine Therapy

Community Farming Interships

Organic Heritage Gardens

Made by Mother Earth’s Core Team

Paul Chavez, South Paha Garden Tribal Sanctuary, Advisory Council, Chairman, Former Bishop Paiute Tribal Council Chairman, and founder of the Owens Valley Career Development Center (OVCDC) and TAINF program that circumnavigates the Sierra, including every Tribal nation from Tahoe to Tehachapi, Yosemite, and Bishop. A UC Davis graduate, Paul owns South Paha Farm, located on his tribal allotment land, serving as a sanctuary for education, deep visioning, and support across generations. We are honored to be invited to farm on Paul’s family lands and to support the entire community’s expansion of true food sovereignty. Paul Chavez, South Paha Farm and sanctuary.

Heart & Soul

Dr. Stephany S. Chacon, Leadership Council Board Chair, is an avid learner of nature. Born and raised in Los Angeles, the concrete jungle was the majority of the environment she was familiar with. She pursued her studies in Chemistry for her B.S and dove into a Soil Science doctorate in Oregon. It was there that she felt immersed in the beauty of nature. Discovering how little we knew of the very ground that gives us food, water, and resources, she focused her studies on the cycling of Soil Organic Matter. She realized all the incoming “novel” organic farming practices and developments for Soil Health in North America was knowledge already held in the words of Indigenous voices. Now, Stephany relocated to the Eastern Sierra and is searching for ways that the knowledge she gained in her studies can benefit people directly, not just the halls of the Ivory tower.

Stephany, a PhD Soil Scientist from UC Merced and an indigenous Mexican American, is the nurturing soil for everyone who surrounds her. Brilliant in mind, humble in nature, her soulful work translates into mindfulness, kindness, generosity, and brilliance. Once a volunteer soil scientist who claimed not to know how to grow food, to now a seasoned novice farmer, always a passionate grant writer, Stephany’s blessing on our team made our foundation possible. Leadership Council board member, serving on the Advisory Council, we are honored to meet each day with Stephany, who brings a calm, solid balance to every project.

Jessica Day Younger Leadership Council Board member, is a bridge-builder between modern health and ancestral wisdom. An enrolled voting member of the Cherokee Nation from Tahlequah, Oklahoma, she moved to the Eastern Sierra mountain range in California in 2003, where she has balanced a career in the legal system with a profound commitment to volunteerism. Born in Kansas and raised in the inner city of Los Angeles, Jessica’s early life was defined by the challenges of poverty and the health impacts of a processed-food diet. Driven to break these cycles, she spent 15 years in the medical field as a Medical Assistant. However, witnessing the “revolving door” of pharmaceutical side effects led her to a soulful pivot in her 40s.
Jessica has served her community through roles in the District Attorney’s office and Probation department, but her heart lies in her volunteer work and her farm. Five years ago, she began farming as a way to unite the community and restore the vital connection between nutrition and health. Jessica’s mission is simple: to break generational cycles of poverty and illness by teaching others how to grow, prepare, and thrive through real food
Today, Jessica is an herbalist dedicated to the synergistic wellness of her Cherokee and Choctaw ancestors. As a farmer and community advocate, Jessica believes that food, nutrition, and soil are the keys to healing dysfunctional roots and helping families live healthy, happy, and whole lives. Jessica is a part of the Leadership Council board.

We are committed to:

Building strong collaborative partnerships with non-profits that serve the future for all children
A 1000-acre land site santuary for the children
Prioritizing Tribal, BIPOC and historically underrepresented students for full and partial scholarships
Offering Nüümü students our courses at no cost
Continued Non-violent Communication Anti-Racist training
Diversifying programming instructors
Offering bilingual programming [Native languages, English & Spanish]

**Brothers Elvis Napolis and Thomas River Waterson** **Nüümü, Assistant Master Gardeners,** will be caring for the 2 new expanded farms this year on Paha Lane. Elvis is a natural musician, and River is a talented farmer. Both bring passion, dedication, and friends to help on the farm.

Celebrating Community Impact and Land Stewardship

This story illustrates how our programs empower communities to reclaim food security, protect natural habitats, and cultivate sustainable earth-based skills. Tribal Members deliver weekly CSA boxes to the elders’ building.

**Christian Younger,** **Tribal Organic Farmer,** **Food Advisory Board,** an indigenous man and a proud enrolled voting member of the Cherokee Nation from Tahlequah, Oklahoma, is inspired by his ancestors to heal his people. He believes that true sovereignty begins with the soil and the commitment to till.
**Sofie Younger, a pregnant mother, Assistant farmer,** **Educator, Artisan,** is a talented baker by trade. She is opening her own gourmet cakes, cupcakes, and artisan goods from the farm. She prepares food from the garden that she and Chris grow.
Sophie Younger and Christian are both talented, trained musicians and strong pillars of our community, raised in the Eastern Sierra of California and deeply rooted here. They are always engaged in strengthening, uplifting, and empowering children. Naturally, creating educational programs for youth, including leading after-school programs in art, music, farming, rock climbing, skiing, snowboarding, and a summer camping wilderness series. Christian and Sophie started farming as interns before becoming founding members of the nonprofit, working with the farming director at Made By Mother Earth and at Warlie Farms in a process called “peer pressure farming.” Inheriting more organic plants than they knew what to do with at the annual 10,000 plant giveaways, they have now become master organic farmers, running their own full-scale farm for two years. Chris and Sophie are actively leading organic farmers at Warlie Farm, invited by Bishop Paiute tribal elder Rick Napolis, to grow the Maternity/Youth Garden and Pickled Pepper Farm behind the Bishop Paiute Tribal Casino. Chris has developed a product from overproduced peppers and created a beloved item for Eastern Sierra farmers’ markets. They have plans for a full-scale pepper farm to expand their product reach to all grocery shelves and possibly beyond. They are also happily expecting their second child (both children are and will be enrolled in the Cherokee Nation). They are, and will continue to be, dedicated to raising their children in the roots of Chris’s cultural values, producing music, and practicing sustainable farming rooted in self-reliance, always enriching their community and inspiring others. Christian is driven by his ancestors to heal his people. He believes that true sovereignty begins with the soil. Today, he is reclaiming the health of his community and his heritage—one plate of **organic, homegrown fruits, vegetables, and herbs** at a time. Chris serves as a Food Advisory Board member.

**Rick Napolis, Warlie Farms owner at the North Paha Farm, located on his tribal allotment land, serves as a Fire Chief** and recruiter of youth for the tribal FS Fire program. The North Paha Garden is located behind the Bishop Paiute Tribal Casino, a Nüümü Mentor, and owner of Warlie Farms on his tribal allotment land. Rick takes youth under his wing and provides them a pathway to what they never imagined possible. Through farming or fire, Rick is a true believer in the dreams of young people. A powerful force to be reckoned with and a gift to his community. It is an honor to pass the farm to Chris and Sofie this season to see what they all grow.

Maya Tsho Jamal Kasberg, CEO, Executive Director, and Non-Profit Founder; Leadership Council Treasurer Board, is a woman who once thought rock climbing big granite walls, surfing remote, secret California waves, and hiking backcountry mountains on a split snowboard were the purest sources of inspiration and highest aspirations. Until she found food deserts near climbing locations, where little locally grown food was available in the Eastern Sierra. As she crossed the wide-open spaces with her surfboard to surf remote coastlines near her childhood home, she discovered they were at risk of being overtaken by urban sprawl. Shocked at the hotels going up on the beach, she became a coastal Guardian of Gaviota.

The problem is the solution. She is the co-founding director of the Ventura County farm-to-school program, which protects large-scale coastal farms and serves 21 million plates of local, organic, and conventional farm-fresh produce annually to schoolchildren, sourced from the nearest farms to their schools. Ventura County district school teachers have told her that as soon as her salad bar went into the school cafeteria, the test scores increased annually for predominantly underserved communities, migrant Mexican indigenous families who grow the food for our nation, and children who come from privilege.

Since 2000, Maya has worked to protect the last undeveloped Southern California coastline- left – intact yet threatened by urban sprawl, extending down to San Diego and Rosarito, Mexico. Despite stopping golf courses and developments and organising thousands of volunteers, the coast remains undeveloped to this day because of our unity in community.

Also a writer and a regenerative ranch manager with permaculture as her foundation in sustainability and self-reliance, she is an organic regenerative/permaculture farmer/designer. Former Bishop Paiute Tribe food sovereignty director since 2021-2022, invited after completing her premedical courses in biochemistry to farm with Tribal elders on their allotment lands, Maya has expanded organic farms and trained interns to become farmers and provided 1000’s of plants to 100’s of people within the Payahunadu food desert of the Eastern Sierra.

For the past year, she has elevated indigenous women’s voices as a consulting liaison. She connected them with large-scale publications, including the LA Times, NPR, and other high-level publications. Connecting the tribe with billionaire investors and securing land-back protection that is being acquired now for wild horse cultural protection.

She has raised thousands of dollars for tribal nations. She is a Water Protector at Standing Rock. She is a mountain protector on the Mauna. She was raised in ceremony since her dad joined AIM in the 70’s, and her uncle was hired by Cesar Chavez. She is the next generation. Whether it is reaching out to elected representatives personally in Sacramento or remotely in DC or turning over the compost to make fertile soil for the sweetest fruits and veggies to grow out of the rich manure, she is on it.