Farmworker/laborers

Job description

A. Job Description and Requirements

Primary tasks will be thinning, leafing planting, training and trellising trees, summer pruning and harvesting of apples, pears, cherries and wine grapes.

General - workers will perform any of the following duties: Orchard clean-up, building and repairing tree trellises, spreading compost, removal of strings and wire from trellises and other hand tasks. Care of young non-producing fruit trees, including weeding, tree trunk painting, hand fertilizing and hand clipping. Training of apple, pear and cherry trees to trellises including limb positioning, clipping and tying limbs and shoots to wire. Must be able to train trees to trellis without constant management supervision. Propping and tying of apple, pear and cherry trees and limbs. Workers will install, deploy and remove shade cloth; install, maintain and operate irrigation system. Ability to pick up, use and safely handle a 12-foot orchard ladder weighing approximately 40 lbs. is necessary for performance of general orchard duties.

Qualified workers (workers who possess at least one season of previous experience performing the following duties) may be offered tasks including, but not limited to, the operation of vehicles to transport equipment and products from one field location or facility to another and the operation of tractors, planters, sprayers, cultivators, cherry dryers, vehicles and/or forklifts. Workers will be instructed in safety and operation of the vehicles/equipment before driving/operation. Vehicles, tractors, and forklifts should be driven in a manner to protect operators, other workers, products, trees, crops and equipment. Repeated failure to obey safety requirements and operating instructions may result in termination. Under supervision of certified pesticide applicators, may mix and apply pesticides, herbicides, fungicides and/or fertilizer.

The vehicles used are standard vans and farm pick-up trucks. The vans will be used to transport farm products, equipment, and the workers. The vehicles provided to workers (van, SUVs, pick-up truck, etc.) are for multi-purpose use on an as-needed basis (e.g., driving workers from employer-provided housing directly to the farm, around the farm properties during the workday, possibly carrying equipment/supplies with them). This may require workers to operate the vehicles on public roads in order to reach the other locations (no CDL w/ passenger endorsement required). These multi-purpose vehicles have a capacity or less than 13 tons, may be used on or off-farm by the workers (e.g., drive to the grocery store, bank, etc. at their discretion). Workers are not required or expected to arrange for the routine pick-up of other workers or groups of workers on a regular schedule or planned basis (e.g., at housing locations or centralized pick-up points).

Under supervision of certified pesticide applicators, may mix and apply pesticides, herbicides, fungicides and/or fertilizer.

Planting - Workers will prepare fields for planting by clearing cull stock, brush and debris; dig holes, plant seedlings or ‘liners’ by hand (including riding on the planting machine, reaching and grabbing a tree and dropping it in the hole and inserting liners in a mechanical planter); shovel dirt around newly planted trees.

Thinning - Thinning is a manual process used to control the size and fruit quality of grown fruit. Employees will be given appropriate training by supervisors. Ability to pick up, use and safely handle a 12-foot orchard ladder weighing approximately 40 lbs. is necessary for performance of thinning tasks.

Special Requirements

B.4 Basic Job Requirements:
D. Please refer to "Drug Policy" in Addendum C.
F. Temperatures may range from 30 to 100 F. Workers may be required to work during occasional showers, not severe enough to stop field operations .
H/J. Work requires repetitive movements and extensive walking.
I. Workers should be able to work on their feet in bent positions for long periods of time.