Horticultural Worker

Job description

Workers will perform tasks for various employers as listed on their contract.
Crops: Potted Annuals, Perennials, Vegetables, Ground Cover and Hanging Baskets

Greenhouse/Nursery: Workers will perform any combination of the following duties concerned with preparing soil and growth media, cultivation, and otherwise participating in horticultural activities: haul, spread, dig, rake, and mix media to prepare the growing areas for production; cover and fill cold frames and greenhouses in preparation for planting; haul, plant, spray, weed, water, prune, trim, shape and space products; tie, bunch, wrap, and pack trees and shrubs to fill orders and load onto trucks for marketing; work on potting line, in a greenhouse, or in an outdoor production area, liners into containers and place in growing area.

Bedding Plants: Workers will fill flats with potting soil in preparation for planting. Filled flats will be stacked for transport to planting area. Worker will then plant plugs or seedlings into flats as instructed by supervisor. Planted flats will be tagged with appropriate picture tags. Completed flats will be watered in by hand and placed in growing area for finishing.

Potted Plants/Hanging Baskets: Workers will fill pots/baskets with potting soil in preparation for planting. One or more transplants will be planted in each container as specified by supervisor. Completed containers will be watered and placed in growing area for finishing. Workers may be required to install hangers and tags on pots or baskets. Workers may be required to place watering tubes into containers to facilitate the irrigation process.

Vegetables, and fruits: Workers will plant cultivate and harvest vegetables. Workers will bend and stoop to pick vegetables according to size, color, shape and degree of maturity and place into field containers. Workers may carry full container weighing approximately forty (40) lbs. and empty into field bin or load onto trailer. May be required to pull and discard culls as directed by supervisor. Pickers will take care not to bruise or scar produce. Pre-harvest activities may include transplanting, hoeing, hand weeding, stringing, and staking installing and removing drip irrigation and plastic, hand seeding, and general ship care up to and after harvest. Workers will stand on feet for long periods of time. Workers are required to work in fields when plants are wet with dew or rain. Temperatures in fields during working hours can range from forty (20) to over one hundred (100) degrees.

General duties: Duties performed in the field will be sporadic all through the contract due to various crops and crop conditions. Duties will/could include preparing soil, planting, pruning, cutting, deadheading, pinching, trimming to shape, spacing plants, fertilizing with granular or liquid fertilizer, cleaning work areas, transporting plant materials in the nursery/greenhouse areas, loading, and unloading plants and all other duties associated with ornamental plant production. Between harvesting, workers may be required to perform duties to prepare crops for marketing. Workers will also unload pallets from trucks or wagons into fields for transplanting. Worker may unload and restock for storage.

Loading and unloading: Workers may be required to work on flatbed trailer tying B&B trees to the trailer with twine. Workers may be required to work loading or unloading bare root trees by hand into refrigerated trailers. Workers will be required to transfer from peat pots to carious selling container and transport to prepared fields for transplanting. When product is ready for marketing workers will load onto trucks to be shipped to purchaser’s locations.

Cultivation: Workers may be required to work as operators of wheel tractors pulling cultivators, mower, or hilling disks.

Watering: Workers may be required to water trees by hand using pumps and hoses.

Special Requirements

Must have three months experience working in agriculture/horticulture. Applicants must be able to furnish affirmative job references from recent employers operating comparable operations establishing acceptable previous experience. Must be physically able to meet and perform all job specifications stated in job order. Must be able to work in the hot humid weather for extended periods of time. Workers are subject to random drug testing at no cost to the employee. Failing or refusing a drug test will result in immediate termination.