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14K views 45 replies 23 participants last post by  milix 
#1 ·
Kim Flottum had an Editorial on this in Decembers' "Bee Culture". And I had a discussion w/ my insurance agent yesterday concerning workers comp. when I hardly employ anyone for more than a week or ten days a year. But that's another Topic.

Are you finding it harder and harder to find help working bees? I have a cpl of friends who have Mexicans working for them. Another guy I know has Russians. The Russians were beekeepers when they came. I don't know how any of these people initially got together.

I'd be interested in hearing what your workforce is like. Is it all just family? Or have you been able to find adequate help outside the family? What ahve your experiences been like?
 
#2 ·
I havent had any trouble. I had a list of people needing work that wanted to help extract. The list of people actually wanting to help in the bees was smaller but I always had help when needed. None of them illegals or relatives.
 
#3 ·
I haven't had to hire any help (yet). I do virtually all the bee work and the family helps at extracting time (though that may be changing soon, as kids are 20, 18, & 17). Don't know if the wife & I can (or want to) handle all the extracting by ourselves, but not looking forward to trying to hire some part-time temporary employees. We'll see what happens over the next couple of years.
 
#5 ·
It is hard to find help. Most people want $15+ an hour to work and I can not hire someone for that wage scale. I have a few freinds that are hobbiest that will come out for a day or two to put supers on but that is about it. mostly to learn how to keep bees but sometimes they slow me down. When I am pulling honey is really when I need the help and then it is like pulling teeth. then when they do help pull after the first time working with me they know not to pick up the phone in August if it is me calling. At bee meetings most will talk about how they almost died trying to keep up with me. It is hard work and you have to love it to do it.
 
#7 · (Edited)
i don't hire people, but it was my understanding that farms don't have to carry workers comp. , the stable down the street doesn't I know. I'll have to look around.

wrong again
Workers' compensation insurance is not required for farms that have less than $1,200 of payroll in the preceding calendar year. Coverage must be obtained effective April 1st of the year immediately following the year where the farm had $1,200 of payroll.

The spouse and minor children (under 18 years old) of a farmer are NOT counted as employees under the WCL as long as they are NOT under an express contract of hire.

If a farm labor contractor recruits or supplies farm laborers for work on a farm, such farm laborers are generally deemed employees of the farmer
 
#8 ·
Well Mike, there is what is required by Law and what is prudent to do. The intelligent thing to do.

If y'all hire day laborers, how do you protect yourself from Liability, should that person you picked up for the day get hurt? I know he is in the business of selling Insurance, but my Insurance Agent says I should have "employees" give me their SS#, that I should have a payroll agreement and a W2 for each one.
 
#9 ·
my understanding hearing through the grapevine that the government is making it nearly impossibly to hire H2A workers next season. dept of labor is reqiring that you fill out intineries for every location of bees and also have land owners sign some form stating that there will be foreign laborers on their property. i have also heard that custom combiners are having to do this. RIDICULOUS!!!!!
 
#14 ·
my understanding hearing through the grapevine that the government is making it nearly impossibly to hire H2A workers next season. dept of labor
H2A is a dominant force in our rural area. Seems like all the very hard agricultural work is done by these people. From April to sept we are surrounded by 100s of them. I have no idea how the work will get done without them. The "Natives" just seem unwilling to do this type of work... anymore.... doesn't seem to matter about the wage. An H2a worker receives nearly $10 per hour and works many hours. I know some of these guys who are using their H2A money buy ranches back home in Mexico.
 
#12 ·
No problemo Beeslave. Yo soy muy, ah, what the hey, I understand how one could draw the conclusion.

So, you figure that my Farm Liability Coverage aught to cover any mishaps? I wonder if the Ins. Co. would see it that way? Or if a Judge would?

When I work bees for friends I expect wages, don't you? Though only one sends me a check and takes out all necassary deductions.
 
#15 ·
Then we wonder why we have the fattest people in the world and 9% unemployment. No one wants to work hard and sweat any more. I helped/worked with a commercial outfit in SW Wisconsin and they looked at beekeeping like a olympic sport. They worked hard and fast and the sweat just poured off me. People need to get off their butts and put in a hard days work or a months work. I talked to my insurance agent about setting up a company that brings corprate employees out to do team building in the bee yard and work there butts off. 1200 a month for insurance but a great idea he thought.
 
#16 ·
Mark, I have to agree with Kim. Help is near impossible to find. I've been hiring workers for 30+ years. I've had all kinds...drunks, drug addicts, criminals, high school grads, college grads, folks on unemployment. The problem as I see it is work ethic. No one really wants to work anymore...now I'm gonna get it. You give folks a job and most Americans think it's an entitlement. They don't know or care much about production. They don't know what it means to give a day's work for a day's pay.

Take extracting honey. I hire field help all season long. Pay what I think a good wage...$13.50-16.00/hr. Workers Comp provided. Housing for anyone I have to bring in from out of state. I can't afford to keep on two folks all summer so I'll have bodies to help with the extracting, so I hire part timers. With my extracting setup we can do 6 drums a day. In the last 30 years, that total has been reached only on a few days. The rest of the time it's 3-4. That's loading each extractor once an hour...not difficult. When I questioned one crew whay they only extract 42 mediums in a day they quit. Typical. Find a mirror in the bathroom and you know why. Or a pile of Genney cans out back.

Two summer ago I said Blank it, and hired two Mexicans...undocumented. From day one until the crop was finished they did 6 drums. Every day. Where the "recommended as great help" Americans could only cut 250 cut combs a day...and that with sticky fingerprints, hair and ladybugs in packaging...the Mexicans cut and packaged 650-750 cuts a day...perfectly clean and square. This year I hired an undocumented Mexican for extracting working alongside a local. What a joke. Horacio was pleasant, respectful, greatful, and exceptional help. The Blanco is foul tempered, demanding, and dis-respectfully, stuffs a cigarette in his face 24 hours a day. While the Blanco can only mix a barrel and a half of syrup all day long with F this and F that, Horacio mixes 4 barrels in the morning and empties 5 into feeders in the afternoon. Followed by...Hey Patron, quiere Horacio para trabajar mass ahora?

But now it's getting too scary to give these folks a job. As Greg says, the H2A program is a joke. The Employment Office...The office of unemployable opportunities is likewise. I think so much of Horacio that I would send him back toMexico and get him papers legally. Good luck Mike.

You folks that think the Mexicans are here to take advantage of our system and wellfare and healthcare and unemployment have got it wrong. They don't want to be Americans any more than you want to be a Mexican. They want a job to provide for the family back in Mexico. These guys havn't seen their families in many years. They send all their money home. Horacio met his wife in New Jersey but sent her back to Chiapas with their two US born children to take care of his mother. One more year with US employment and his "casa de concreto" will be finished in Chiapas, and he can go home. Maybe see his mother again before she passes. Would you live that way? Would you sneak across the border at Ogdensburg, NY if your family was hungry and you couldn't find a job in Brashers Falls, NY? You bet you would. So would everyone else here.

I'm not asking to be allowed to hire undocumented aliens. I'm asking to have access to quality employees that know and want to work hard for their pay. Allow me to bring in the help I need that no one here in the states wants to do.
 
#17 ·
Two summer ago I said Blank it, and hired two Mexicans...undocumented. From day one until the crop was finished they did 6 drums. Every day. Where the "recommended as great help" Americans could only cut 250 cut combs a day...and that with sticky fingerprints, hair and ladybugs in packaging...the Mexicans cut and packaged 650-750 cuts a day...perfectly clean and square. This year I hired an undocumented Mexican for extracting working alongside a local. What a joke. Horacio was pleasant, respectful, greatful, and exceptional help. The Blanco is foul tempered, demanding, and dis-respectfully, stuffs a cigarette in his face 24 hours a day.
I have walked down this same path... and I must say the scenary is the same. In other words I agree with you 100%. I can tell almost identical stories. I suppose nearly all our hispanics are illegals... except for the H2A workers, I can only imagine what will happen if certain political factions have their way.
 
#18 ·
When I was back at home we would hire one or two Mexican's during planting season. I sat next to them on a vegetable transplanter. I would work as fast as I could to keep up. If you looked at them they looked like they were taking it easy. We ended up hiring one for two years, April-Oct. He would go home each winter. His father plowed with oxen. He saved enough money to buy some land and get married. We would have to hire twice as many "locals" to do the job.

This also ended up generating a lot of business. We ended up planting several acres of hot peppers and tomatillos. They would come and pick bushels and bushels.

If I were to ever get to the point where I needed to hire help, that will be never, I'd look to the Amish.

Tom
 
#22 ·
I've used the h2A program for the past 10 years. Every year they add a hurtle or two. It actually feels normal now to scramble and find the documents that the DOL suddenly needs. You get 5 business days to respond to a request for information. I guess that's OK. But sometimes I'm 1000 miles away from my office.

I just got my approval letter a week ago. For me the process was only a little bit harder than last year. Everyones expeirience is different, interpretation can cause problems. It seems we have new rules every year that no one is totally sure how to enforce.

Both the ABF and AHPA have worked very hard over the past few years to change the process so it works better. I have heard that law makers have been willing to let us make any changes we want. Basically because we are not asking for any money. Every change can create a new problem. It seems we go 2 steps forward then1 step back. It can make your head spin. It's really scary if you decide to count on the h2a program to get things done.

You guys are right. It's difficult and expensive. But it works just exactly the way you need it to work.
 
#24 ·
Lets just keep applauding our guvmint as they extend unemployment to 99 weeks and wonder why no one will work! We all know the answer! The only people who work are those who were raised and educated to. It is very very simple to get people to work. The job must be a thing of value and not easily given up. The cost of giving it up has to be higher than spending another 99 weeks on unemployment welfare. All my life I did the work that americans just won't do! I know it is possible.
 
#25 ·
in our area is is hard to find people willing to work in any area much less beekeeping. That said, extrememly hard. I have been able to procur help from students home from university, teach them all you know in a year and then they are gone. Some reliable some not very.
Right now, when i need our pastor's wife, mother of 4, home schooler, will come out when needed. She is an information nut and loves working with the bees.
On to extraction...can not get help in this area...to hot and humid in the honey house.
We pay into workers comp...compusory even if you higher a local for one day to help vaccinate cows.
The Canadian Honey Council is working on making it easier to employ foreigners. Still a long way to go though from what i have heard. As for us and our farm, we are not big enough to higher that kind of help
 
#27 ·
I really know nothing about the H2A programs in the US, but I know a lot about the value added and committment of undocumented Latino labor and could tell you plenty of stories that would break your heart.
I thought you on this thread might like to to see another farmer's take on this issue. I found his comment that he knew by lunch break on the first day that hiring locally was a mis calculation absolutely stunning.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/05/us/farmers-strain-to-hire-american-workers-in-place-of-migrant-labor.html

Hiring Locally for Farm Work Is No Cure-All
The New York Times, October 5, 2011
By KIRK JOHNSON
OLATHE, Colo. — How can there be a labor shortage when nearly one out of every 11 people in the nation are unemployed?
That’s the question John Harold asked himself last winter when he was trying to figure out how much help he would need to harvest the corn and onions on his 1,000-acre farm here in western Colorado.
The simple-sounding plan that resulted — hire more local people and fewer foreign workers — left Mr. Harold and others who took a similar path adrift in a predicament worthy of Kafka.
The more they tried to do something concrete to address immigration and joblessness, the worse off they found themselves.
“It’s absolutely true that people who have played by the rules are having the toughest time of all,” said Senator Michael Bennet, a Democrat from Colorado.
Mr. Harold, a 71-year-old Vietnam War veteran who drifted here in the late ’60s, has participated for about a decade in a federal program called H-2A that allows seasonal foreign workers into the country to make up the gap where willing and able American workers are few in number. He typically has brought in about 90 people from Mexico each year from July through October.
This year, though, with tough times lingering and a big jump in the minimum wage under the program, to nearly $10.50 hour, Mr. Harold brought in only two-thirds of his usual contingent. The other positions, he figured, would be snapped up by jobless local residents wanting some extra summer cash.
“It didn’t take me six hours to realize I’d made a heck of a mistake,” Mr. Harold said, standing in his onion field on a recent afternoon as a crew of workers from Mexico cut the tops off yellow onions and bagged them.
Six hours was enough, between the 6 a.m. start time and noon lunch break, for the first wave of local workers to quit. Some simply never came back and gave no reason. Twenty-five of them said specifically, according to farm records, that the work was too hard. On the Harold farm, pickers walk the rows alongside a huge harvest vehicle called a mule train, plucking ears of corn and handing them up to workers on the mule who box them and lift the crates, each weighing 45 to 50 pounds.
“It is not an easy job,” said Kerry Mattics, 49, another H-2A farmer here in Olathe, who brought in only a third of his usual Mexican crew of 12 workers for his 50-acre fruit and vegetable farm, then struggled to make it through the season. “It’s outside, so if it’s wet, you’re wet, and if it’s hot you’re hot,” he said.
Still, Mr. Mattics said, he can’t help feeling that people have gotten soft.
“They wanted that $10.50 an hour without doing very much,” he said. “I know people with college degrees, working for the school system and only making 11 bucks.”
A mismatch between employers’ requirements and the skills and needs of the jobless — repeated across industries — has been a constant theme of this recessionary era. But here on the farm, mismatch can mean high anxiety.
The H-2A program, in particular, in trying to avoid displacing American citizens from jobs, strongly encourages farmers to hire locally if they can, with a requirement that they advertise in at least three states. That forces participants to take huge risks in guessing where a moving target might land — how many locals, how many foreigners — often with an entire season’s revenue at stake. Survival, not civic virtue, drives the equation, they say.
“Farmers have to bear almost all the labor market risk because they must prove no one really was available, qualified or willing to work,” said Dawn D. Thilmany, a professor of agricultural economics at Colorado State University. “But the only way to offer proof is to literally have a field left unharvested.”
Mr. Harold’s experience is a repeated refrain where farm labor is seasonal and population sparse. And even many immigration hard-liners have come to agree that the dearth of Americans willing to work the fields requires some sort of rethinking, at least, of the H-2A program. Indeed, Representative Lamar Smith of Texas, a conservative Republican, is pushing a bill that would greatly expand the number of foreign guest workers admitted to the country each year.
In Colorado, the unemployment rate in many rural counties is also significantly lower than in the cities — two neighboring counties here, for example, had 5.5 percent and 6 percent unemployment rates in August, according to state figures, compared with 9.1 percent for the nation as a whole. The big increase in the wage rate for H-2A workers, meanwhile, up nearly $2.50 an hour — calculated by averaging what farmers had to pay last year — also suggests that labor demand was already rising.
Mr. Harold usually hires about 50 local workers for the season — regulars who have worked summers for years — and most returned this year, he said. Finding new employees was where he ran into trouble. He was able to recover after the season started, he said, by rushing in another group of H-2A workers from Mexico.
But the broader story of labor in agriculture, economists and historians said, is that through good times and bad and across socioeconomic lines, people who find better lives off the farm rarely return. Mr. Harold and other H-2A farmers said that most of the local residents who tried field work this summer, for example, were Hispanic, many of whom, they said, had probably immigrated in years past for agricultural work before taking better-paid jobs in construction or landscaping.
Other farmers left in the lurch by local workers conceded that what they had to offer was a tough sell — full-time but temporary work. About 56,000 foreign workers came into the country with H-2A visas last year, according to the most recent federal figures, down from 60,000 in 2009.
Heath Terrell is one of the few new local residents who stuck it out. Mr. Terrell, a former hay hauler, was hired to drive a corn truck. That job kept him out of the fields, and out of the sun. Now, as the season has shifted from corn to onions, Mr. Terrell, 42, said he might just stay on with Mr. Harold through the winter, or at least onion season.
 
#28 ·
Hi,
My name is Lukas. I am from Poland. I have bees in Poland. I wanted to work in the U.S. but in beekeeping Pole can not go without a visa to the USA. It is very difficult to get a visa. The program h2a is only for the proffesions in which Americans do not want to work. Visa is issued for 3 years. How many money is paid per hour in beekeeping in the U.S., how many hours i can work per week?
Sorry for the mistake in the language.

Lukas
 
#29 ·
Nothing wrong w/ your language. No worse than folks over here produce. :)

I'm not hiring, but guys I sometimes work for pay $10.00 per hour and $15.00 per hour, plus lodging and meals. 40 hours work per week or more sometimes.

Keep looking, you'll probably find someone to work for.
 
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