Farm Worker

Job description

CHRISTMAS TREE OPERATIONS: Lift and carry 80-pound trees continuously throughout the day and after dark with lighting provided. Cut trees using hand saw or chainsaw. Bundle trees, prepare for transport, and load them into containers. Field work and clean up. Maintain a safe and healthy work area and report any safety concerns to the supervisor.

Other job specifications include:
1. Workers will perform maintenance in Christmas tree fields and related product grown for Christmas sales fields including cone picking, weeding, hoeing with long-handled hoes, trunk painting, spreading fertilizer, culturing Christmas trees, base
pruning and tagging Christmas trees.
2. Workers must be able to use hand pruners, machetes and other hand tools involved with the harvesting and culturing of Christmas trees.
3. Christmas tree/related produce operations, workers must harvest/cut full-grown trees/product, lift, and carry trees up to 80 pounds, and load them into a container, continuously throughout the day.
4. Provide general labor to assist in planting new trees by clearing property, planting seedlings, assembling trellises, installing irrigation, spreading of composted material and other labor considered necessary to develop new properties.
5. Cares for trees during the growing process - recognize tree diseases.
6. Farm clean up tasks include picking up garbage around the field and harvest landings and cutting and burning unmarketable trees located in clear-cut sections.
7. Spot weed spraying, Limb removal, hoeing weeds, maintaining areas at the Shop, Office, or Housing.
8. Maintain a safe and healthy work area and report any safety concerns to the supervisor.

Workers may also:
1. Utilize tractors to haul harvested trees, cones, foliage, and crops
2. Mix and apply chemicals and fertilizers
3. Operate trucks on farm to carry farm equipment to worksites, move freshly harvested trees and crops. Basic maintenance of agricultural equipment.
5. Put crops into boxes, gaylord containers, and trucks.
6. Operate farm equipment used to produce and harvest Christmas trees/related products. This would include balers, elevators, small tractors, packaging equipment and other automated devices.

Workers with a clean MVR and able to obtain an insurable driver's license may be requested to operate employer-owned trucks or other multi-purpose vehicles to haul tools, supplies, crops, and transport workers (whether on or off farm) to and from the worker housing to the farm properties and occasionally around the farm properties during the workday including on public roads to reach the fields where work will be performed; and/or may transport workers to the grocery store, bank, or laundry facilities on an as needed basis. No applicants or workers will be rejected for not possessing a driver’s license or who may be unwilling to drive company vehicles. Such duties are completely optional and may be declined by the worker at his or her sole discretion.

The employer attests that workers and handlers will receive annual pesticide safety training in accordance with the Worker Protections Standard (WPS) mandated by the Oregon Department of Agriculture.

Special Requirements

- Must be able to lift and/or load 80 lbs.
- 3 months of verifiable experience required working in a Christmas tree nursery. Applicants must furnish verifiable job references or comparable third-party documentation from recent employers to establish acceptable prior experience.
- Employer will train.
- There will be a demonstration period to familiarize workers with specific jobs and to demonstrate proper methods of working.
- OT/Holiday is not mandatory.
- Crops listed may or may not be planted and employer is not limited to crops listed.
- Work may take place when temperatures are below freezing and above 100 degrees Fahrenheit.
- May require extensive pulling and/or pushing of tools, wheelbarrows, fruit containers, etc.
- May require worker to sit and/or walk for extensive periods of time while sorting, picking, examining, weeding, transporting, pruning, etc.