Over 800 people have contacted Greater Shepparton City Council interested in harvest work since the council redoubled recruitment efforts. Starting in mid-January, Council and Fruit Growers Victoria have been running a fruit picking 101 workshop at McNab Orchards.
In a good sign, roughly half of those invited to each two-hour-long unpaid session are turning up. On Monday eight of the expected 14 attendees showed – three from Melbourne, two from Seymour, one from Shepparton and two from Saudi Arabia (living in Ardmona). Their instructor on the day was life-long fruit picker Sidney Aspland, who took them under the pear trees and gave them both work and life advice.
“Don’t bring the fruit to you, bring yourself to the fruit,” Mr Aspland said from his ladder. “This job is 50 per cent physical and 50 per cent mental. the hardest thing is to stay here all day and keep going.” Mr Aspland did not pretend fruit picking was an easy job, but he had high hopes for the workshop attendees. “These guys have rung and chosen to come and that gives them a big advantage,” he said.
“The idea of this (workshop) is to try and give them a head start.”
Mr Aspland said in the past Australians hadn’t lasted on orchards because they “started in summer, picked two bins and made $80 bucks per day and realised they’d be better off on the dole”. “What they are missing is that in 12 months they could be earning $500 a day,” he said. “One year I averaged 14 bins a day for the whole season, earning $560 a day, and that’s good money.”
McNab Orchards owner Mitchell McNab said Mr Aspland knew “every trick in the book” and was giving the recruits a leg up. “We know it’s a tough job, but at the same time it’s like anything you do. If you rock up the first day and think you’re going to be a pro at it, it’s not going to be the case,” Mr McNab said.
In light of the 50 per cent attendance rate at the workshops, Mr McNab was keeping positive. “We’ve had 800-odd responders through the council website and half of that is 400 which is still a pretty good number,” he said. “They are being trained here, I’ll get a percentage of them, and a few other orchards around the area will get a selection as well.”
Currently Mr McNab needs to double his workforce from 30 to 60 before the end of February. Interested pickers learning on the day had various reasons for joining, ranging from it “seeming like a nice opportunity” to it being a launching pad towards a food science degree.
Sidney’s picking hacks
1. Always start at the same spot on the trees;
2. Place your ladder properly. Don’t step on the top rung. Use your shin to lean against the rail while picking for balance;
3. Don’t go back to the bin unless you have a full bag;
4. Pick from the top so that when the bag gets a bit heavy, you can come down and top it up at the bottom branches before emptying the lot into the bin;
5. If it drops on the ground, it stays on the ground;
6. If you are left handed, pick anti-clockwise around the tree. If you are right handed, pick clockwise;
7. Don’t eat after 10.30am, otherwise you’ll be too hot to digest the food and it won’t give you the energy you need;
8. Light cotton shirts are best. A good shirt has a collar and buttons down to the wrists to protect the skin from getting scratched by the trees and rubbed raw by the bag;
9. Go to your local library and download their app;
10. Eat as much of the produce as you want while working.
For more information about fruit picking work, go here.
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