Nursery Worker

Employment and caretaking position at 25 year old permaculture/Food Forest Homestead and Nursery in Northern California Job Description: Nursery/Farm Worker - We are looking for 1-2 dynamic, diligent and hard working people to come live and work with us at our robust homestead and thriving family-run online nursery business, Fruitwood Nursery. As a member of a small team, this position is multi-faceted. You would be integral to the stewardship of our exceptionally diverse collection (plantings) of fruiting trees, bushes, vines and native plants, our large subsistence gardens,as well as to the operation of our online nursery business. The nature of this work is seasonal and flexible, and the workload and responsibilities reflect that seasonality. Full time work is available November- June and more part time (25-30 hours per week) July-October. Roles & Responsibilities include but are not limited to: Field Work - March-Sept: ● Cultivating with heavy hoe, fertilizing and harvesting 3 acres of perennial fruit trees, bushes and vines. ● Planting, cultivating and harvesting large subsistence annual vegetable gardens Pruning - Nov-Jan: ● Dormant season pruning of all deciduous perennial plants in a 3 acre mixed orchard ○ This includes over several hundred fruit trees ranging from full size to more intensively planted compact trees. Requiring working on 8-10 ft. orchard ladders in cool-cold weather. Nursery Work - Jan-April: ● Collecting scions and rooted plugs for customer orders. ● Packing customer orders to prepare for shipment. ● Propagating plants for nursery via cuttings and seed ● Cutting prunings to size for sale as scion wood *All nursery work done outside and in open-air sheds, often in cold and wet weather conditions* Homestead work - seasonal and ongoing as needed ● Brush piling, chipping, fencing, irrigation and general maintenance ● Mucking animal pens ● Mowing and vegetation management ● Care for large subsistence annual gardens Experience and Expectations: ● At least 1 year related gardening, agriculture, nursery or field work experience ● Preferably some Pruning experience ● Is comfortable with and enjoys the challenges of working physically in the outdoors ● Availability to work outside in cold winter and hot summer conditions. ● Availability to work up to 40 hours a week generally during our busiest season December-April.. ● Ability to lift 50 lbs. ● Ability to comfortably and safely work from 8-10 ft orchard ladders for pruning and harvesting. ● Experience with rustic and remote living conditions. Orleans is a small, remote community, and winter can sometimes prevent easy travel. Compensation ● We offer compensation starting at $15.00/hour depending on experience,with a potential for a raise within 3 months. General Description of Homestead and Nursery: Our homestead is a 26 year old dynamic permaculture forest garden which Includes a wide diversity of temperate and subtropical fruit trees, bushes and vines as well as many medicinal and culinary herbs and flowers . We also care for 10-15 goats, 30 chickens, 10-20 ducks, 5-10 turkeys, and honey bees. We own and operate ------------ where we sell propagation wood and rooted cutting plugs, from our diverse collection of over 1,000 varieties of fruiting plants that we have planted on our homestead. We also contract out to grow native plants locally and we supply our former online nursery ------------ with most of their propagation wood. We have intensively planted about 3 acres to pomegranates apples pears persimmons, paw paws, peaches plums citrus, cherries, figs olives and jujubes, table and wine grapes, kiwis and berries, as well as perennial vegetables such as asparagus, rhubarb, tree collards, horseradish, artichokes, and a large homestead annual garden and roses. Due to our generous Mediterranean climate we are able to grow and reproduce both the classic northern temperate fruiting plants as well as many sub-tropical fruits. We are very passionate about preserving plant diversity and our homestead and business reflect that passion. Our location is paradisiacal and remote, a southwest facing slope right above the Klamath River. We use minimal tilling and make extensive use of perennial cover crops and animal grazing throughout our orchard and gardens. Marc has been a homesteader, market farmer and orchardist nurseryman for the last 50 years with extensive knowledge in the area of agriculture and horticulture. He also has extensive carpentry experience, knowledge of alternative building and solar power systems. Corrina has been a full partner in managing our homestead, annual and perennial plantings and on-line businesses for the past 25 years. Together we are working to create a loving, low input, productive and self-sustaining homestead that can also serve as a model for others. We have 2 children, 27 and 16. We are passionate about our family, homesteading, the outdoors, simple sustainable living, plants, eating healthy and a TV free environment. In our leisure time we enjoy doing fun things with our kids, hiking in the mountains, making music, swimming in the river and working on craft projects. The spirit of the farm is one of hard work and good family fun. We are looking for people who are emotionally mature, responsible and good communicators as well as physically fit, tough and robust. A good fit for us would be someone who is passionate about growing food, has interest in our nursery business and mission, and enjoys spending time being active outdoors, living near wilderness, and appreciates animals and their products. Related farm and/or nursery experience is preferred. For an application and more information please email ------------ Please see our website and youtube videos@ ------------ for more information about us and our work.