Manually plants, cultivates, and harvests vegetables, fruits, nuts, horticultural specialties, and field crops. Uses hand tools, such as shovels, trowels, hoes, tampers, pruning hooks, shears, and knives. Duties may include tilling soil and applying fertilizers; transplanting, weeding, thinning, or pruning crops; applying pesticides; or cleaning, grading, sorting, packing, and loading harvested products. May construct trellises, repair fences and farm buildings, or participate in irrigation activities.
This career is part of the Agriculture, Food and Natural Resources cluster Plant Systems pathway.
A person in this career:
- Sets up and operates irrigation equipment.
- Operates tractors, tractor-drawn machinery, and self-propelled machinery to plow, harrow and fertilize soil, or to plant, cultivate, spray and harvest crops.
- Repairs and maintains farm vehicles, implements, and mechanical equipment.
- Harvests fruits and vegetables by hand.
- Applies pesticides, herbicides or fertilizers to crops.
- Informs farmers or farm managers of crop progress.
- Directs and monitors the work of casual and seasonal help during planting and harvesting.
- Identifies plants, pests, and weeds to determine the selection and application of pesticides and fertilizers.
- Clears and maintains irrigation ditches.
- Records information about crops, such as pesticide use, yields, or costs.
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