Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
loading the citrus. Rob says, “For me personally, it's December. We were
running sixteen to eighteen hours a day from Thanksgiving to the middle
of January. Extra people: picking two to five and packing eight to ten. That's
for my own stuff. What I am picking right now I saved just for the mail
order, and I am going to be lucky to make it.” Mary says: “we run ours
starting in November, and other people we'll run until April.”
Rob has to work off-farm for four months of the year. “My health insur-
ance just went up to $508 a month, and my company pays for all that. That
is $12,000 a year. That is why I work another job, just for health insurance.
Jesus Christ, that stuff is out of control. I work for an engineering firm.
Got me a full-time job. Only worked four months last year with a full-time
package. That ain't a bad deal, is it? When I interviewed I said, 'Here is the
deal: I don't go to work before May and on October 15 Iamdone,period,
final, that is it. I can't work any other way.' They said, 'You are just what
we are looking for.' Structural steel: water towers, power plants, nuclear
plants, bridges. I like the bridges the best, though. They are wide open. It
is usually six to seven days a week. When I leave here, I am not looking for
a forty-hour-a-week job. I work four and a half months pretty much with
only three or four days off. I came home for two weeks, but while I was on
the job, you couldn't pay me to take a day off.” This construction job takes
him far from home. But he hopes to stay a bit closer to the farm. “Now we
have about fourteen acres in production. If I pull a job in Florida for the
next two years, I will have seventeen in production real quick.”
As for pest problems, Rob explains, “This little bastard right here: rust
mite. If you have a crop of fruit that looks like that one, you have a crop
of losers. You can't sell that stuff out on the market.” Conventional growers
spray synthetic chemicals to kill the rust mite, but Rob asks, “Why would
you want to spray motor oil on your trees? Vegetable oil works just great. I
always fought rust mites, and I knew that there was something to do. I got
this little gardening topic, and it was talking about cottonseed oil, and I was
thinking, why can't you just get a jug of Mazola and dump it on the tree?
Then this guy from Peru said that they use olive oil, they have tons of olive
oil down there, and they just spray it on the tree almost straight. So I got
to thinking, why not use the vegetable oil? I use organic soybean oil. It is
fairly thick. When you spray it on there it stays. It will go through quite a
few thunderstorms. Now it won't hold three days in fourteen inches of rain.
Nothing will. But just afternoon thunderstorms, it stays right on the trees.
It has good staying power. It works wonders.” Mary joins in the praises.
“The trees were just a gorgeous green after we gave three applications. We
basically tested it last year, and you wouldn't believe how gorgeous it is.
[113],
(23)
Lines: 289 to 293
———
0.0pt PgVar
———
Normal Page
PgEnds: T
E
X
[113],
(23)
