Farm Laborer

Number of Workers Requested:  8

Workers will clean the areas around the greenhouses and float beds to keep free of weeds and debris. Help to keep plants trimmed back before setting time by using a lawn mower on a trolly system for safety. When the setting process begins, the worker will ride a four-row setter, feeding the tobacco plants into rubber shoes, that insert them into the ground. This process requires long periods of sitting and loading trays from wagons onto the setter. Workers will rotate, following the setter on foot to check for plants that may have fallen out or gotten missed and replant them by hand. Workers will “chop out” the tobacco. This involves walking the rows with a garden hoe and chopping the weeds out between the plants. Topping involves walking the fields of rows and breaking off the top couple of inches of the plant that blooms out. The cutting/spiking/hauling process involves the workers using a tobacco knife to cut the plants at the bottom of the stalks and piling them into sections of (6) plants, then going back to place those plants on wooden tobacco sticks using a metal spike, then standing the stick up in the ground. After 2-3 days, the workers will haul the sticks by loading them onto wagons/trailers, then hanging the sticks into large barns, sectioned off by tear poles. Workers must be able to lift 50-60 pounds repeatedly. With the stripping process, the workers will take down the sticks of tobacco from barns, remove the stalks, learning to grade into (3) piles by color and looks, then bundled into large burlap bags, tied, and tagged with numbers for bailing. Workers are expected to bundle/tie up their tobacco sticks, discard empty stalks on wagons and be responsible for their bags, plastic, and cleaning up the barn after stripping. Workers will help with the baling process by pressing the tobacco into large baling machines that compress tobacco into bales and weigh it. Workers will do basic farm jobs (cleaning, fencing, mowing, weed eating, etc.) during the between times of tobacco processes to help ensure their 3/4 guaranteed hours of their contracts. Lifting, bending, and repeated movements are ALL requirements that tobacco labor workers have to do.