Welcome!
I invite all current and former custom harvesters, harvest crewmembers, and farmers that hire custom harvesters to comment, post questions, and start dialogue about custom harvesting. I intend this to be a forum for people interested in custom harvesting, agriculture, the Great Plains region, Great Plains culture, Great Plains geography, Great Plains history, Great Plains communities, and probably additional topics too. I hope to get people involved who know more about the Great Plains than anybody else - custom harvesters. I have studied the Great Plains extensively in college, but I have learned at least as much through summers spent combining wheat (and a little barley). I will start more specific topical threads as I go. This is to be a forum for learning, discussion, and debate. Please do not use this blog for advertising, recruiting employees, or searching for employers. I expect contacts may be made through this blog, but that is not its purpose.
Custom Harvesting Operators and Your Labor Situations
I have been thinking about this part of the research project for several years when I began meeting and hearing about a lot of international labor working for harvest crews. I naturally wanted to know why. So that is how I began. I am still collecting data and welcome anyone's input. I will be sending out questionnaires to the rest of the members of the USCHI in the winter and hope to get a good response. I will also be attending the USCHI Convention in Topeka.
I have been involved in harvest since 1992...after I graduated from KSU. Must have been there the same time as you. Labor is a very serious problem for most harvesters. We hire internationals and try to keep everything very legal. We train them and take to safety meetings and such. I know some that let them drive with no CDL's and have no clue about safety at all. Makes it hard on the rest of us. I'd love to visit more about harvest.
ReplyDeleteWendy, you are my first poster! I am back in Kentucky finally and getting ready for classes to start tomorrow (Aug. 18). I will have more time to spend with this after the first couple days of classes. I would love to know how you found this blogspot! I haven't told anybody about it yet. My plan is to send out e-mails to my list of reseach participants and to publish the address in the USCHI monthly magazine.
ReplyDeleteRegarding labor, it does seem to be a difficult problem. Do you have any educated guess about what percentage of the harvest labor is international? I have met some operators that have found unique, niche ways to still get all American labor, but I am still trying to collect more data so I can figure out how common that is. Thank you for posting!
Another important question I have is, what are the main motivations of workers who are coming to the U.S. to work the harvest?
ReplyDeleteHi Jason, nice to finally find you on the bloggersphere! I imagine you are back into the swing of things, if you started back to work in August. We are stranded in Kenmare, ND along with several other harvesters, patiently waiting for the rains to end so we can get back to work...but you probably follow our blog and know all that...it's been a long month and a half of "hurry up and wait"....
ReplyDeleteI met Kuntz Harvesting last summer when I was helping with the wheat harvest & am interested in Canadian harvesters' labor issues as well.
ReplyDeleteHi Jason, Just got your newsletter this morning and I am excited about your progress and look forward to visiting with you at convention.
ReplyDeleteI think as you visit with all the harvesters you will learn it takes a "Passion for this industry" to pack up and leave our homes each spring and not return till Christmas. It's not a job it's our lives and something you can't really understand unless you are one of us!!
Yes, we (my wife and I) will be there Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. I'm looking forward to it!
ReplyDeleteneed one site with all jobs avalible harvesters need to spend more time setting up websites so us operatores can research who we want to run with silage harvesters need websites cant find many of them i have run into many people wanting to go on harvest and couldnt find info and as years whent by they lost intrest and never whent i have harvested in united states australia new zealand england ireland brazil the pay in the states was the lowest other than brazil yes it is for the experiance because that is about all you end up with you get what you pay for if you want good dependable labor it is going to cost you fringe benifits and how you treat your help is always more inportant than any amount of money
ReplyDelete