A taste of caring and community

A woman wanders into the barn wanting advice about what she should do with her six 12-week-old rooster chicks that won’t lay eggs. Another woman asks if her three sons can volunteer in the fields this summer. Volunteer Abby Harper comes in with a bag of freshly cut spinach for a customer. The phone rings and Sal offers advice on where to find asparagus plants. Sal Sergi has the answers to everything. “You got to,’’ he says, “after 69 years in the business.’’

“We’re not like farmers,’’ he says. “We give the plants more care. You can taste the love.’’

Brothers Peter, 79, and Sal (“upper 70s’’) Sergi, and a host of dedicated volunteers run the five-acre Sergi Farms, a rural oasis at the end of a dirt lane in the heart of tree-lined suburban Belmont. It’s the last working farm in Belmont. None of the volunteers is paid; they receive free veggies and eggs.

The group is growing lettuce, chard, beets, carrots, bell peppers, eggplant, squash, tomatoes, and basil. But it’s the delectably sweet bicolor corn - planted in April and now being picked - that has earned the farm its reputation. Elizabeth Darlington, who has set up the volunteers primarily through craigslist.com, calls it “miracle corn.’’ The Sergis sell at the Belmont Farmers’ Market Thursday afternoons.

The brothers are hard-working sons of the Depression. When their parents, Josephine and Giuseppi, came from Sicily in 1921, they initially settled in Boston’s West End. Peter remembers at age 8 working in the rail yards during the day and shining shoes at night and then handing his dad 50 cents. To help support the family, Sal went into construction. “We were poor,’’ says Sal. “There were nine of us boys, my father was a tough man, and we had to work hard. You had to in those days.’’

Eventually they moved to Perry Street in Watertown, where they raised cucumbers in their back yard and farmed celery in Lexington before they began renting the Belmont acreage in 1942.

“We’ve got farming in the blood,’’ says Peter.

Always in motion, Peter helps graduate student Kathy Ellen Davis set up the old seeder - a splendid antique - but has her seed the parsley herself. He then launches into a story about their Belgian workhorse, who used to consume a gallon of Black Label beer every day along with a half gallon of ice cream and a Happy Homes Bakery blueberry pie.

Every year introduces something new to the place: a couch, a stove, fruit trees, new signs. Twenty chickens were brought in to excite children and provide eggs for the volunteers. Yulia Katzman, who’s 14 and calls the farm “another home,’’ is in the coop showing Narineh Chase, 4, the right way to pick up an egg. With a little guidance, Yulia and volunteer Renee Reynolds have built huge horizontal tiers in rich loam for strawberries so that you can harvest the plump fruits quickly and comfortably - standing up.

Sergi Farms’ land was part of a 1633 grant from Charles I that stretched from Belmont to Boston Harbor. In 2002 the Ogilby family, relatives of original owner Abraham Hill, put the land in a trust that will guarantee it for agricultural use forever. The Sergis continue to farm the land for the Ogilbys.

The old-fashioned farm even offers home cooking for the workers. Sal cooks every Saturday afternoon on the old wood stove or new electric Hotpoint. His motto is “When you’re laid back, you do more work.’’ Today, he’s making beet salad. Last week they feasted on frittata.

The farm’s webmaster, Mike Chase, who volunteers with his wife and child most weekends, loves the beet salad. He also loves being part of a healthy model family. “We even get built-in grandparents.’’

Sergi Farms, 34 Glenn Road, Belmont, www.sergifarm.org