EVANSVILLE (Indiana) COURIER & PRESS

August 6, 2010

Migrant workers help local farmers harvest melons

By Garret Mathews

DECKER, Ind. — As the tractor churns through inch-thick dust, a 12-man crew of migrant laborers tosses watermelons from field to wagon six rows at a time with the choreographed precision of a dance team. The conveyance holds about 400 melons. It's filled in less than 20 minutes.

"I couldn't come close to keeping up with these guys with the underhand throwing and catching," says Mike Turbett, the 43-year-old Vincennes, Ind., man who helps supervise the harvest for the 120 acres of the Obermeyer & Turbett Farm that's devoted to watermelons. "They come here to work, and they pick their hind ends off. There's no playing around."

Afternoon heat indexes exceeded 100 degrees earlier this week in the fields near Decker in southern Knox County.

"I weigh 118 pounds dripping wet," Turbett said. "I got on the pallet scales the other day, and I had lost two pounds. That's weight I can't afford to shed. And, man, I'm not even picking.

The reed-thin pickers drink casually — never gulping — from giant jugs of water. None speak English. They smile at a visitor and flex rippling arm muscles.

"Ten years ago, it was a 50-50 ratio between having local folks and imports, but now it's almost all migrants around here," Turbett said. "Kids have too many other activities like sports and stuff at school. Plus, these fellows have more of a focus. If you're a farmer and you don't have migrants to bring the crops in, you're wasting your time planting."

Knox County often leads the state in production of watermelons and cantaloupes. The harvest begins in July and continues into September.

Migrant picking season

Many of the migrants are from Mexico and are in the U.S. on six-month work visas. Pay is upward of $8 an hour. They live in motels or rental apartments. Many work under the auspices of crew chiefs who recruit them to come to America. Transportation is often on converted school buses.

"Their picking season starts in Florida with tomatoes and peppers, and they gradually work their way north," Turbett said. "We've had this same crew for four years."

Two dozens migrants work on the Obermeyer & Turbett operation. Those who aren't in the field report to the packing house. The farm's 30 melon wagons maintain a constant caravan over the six miles.

"This is gonna be a pretty decent season for watermelons," Turbett said. "We'll pick this same field five times. The ones that are babies now will be ready to harvest in three weeks."

The most important crew members are the "cutters" who report to the fields before the pickers.

"They are the ones who designate which melons are ripe enough to be harvested," Turbett said. "You don't want a mistake here of selecting ones that are too green. Once they're picked, you can't exactly put them back on the vine."

Packing the melons

These workers use knives to, in Turbett's words, "X out" melons that shouldn't be tossed into the wagon.

"You only get one shot at a melon. You want to be sure that shot takes place at the right time."

As Turbett heads to the packing house, he hopes to find at least one truck waiting that will haul the day's melons to customers in Michigan and Minnesota, but the gravel parking lot is empty.

"The most we ever loaded in one day was 10 trailers. We started at 7 a.m. and didn't quit until 1 in the morning. A single day of that was all I needed. Our average is more like filling five to six trucks."

At the packing house, watermelons are loaded onto a conveyor in the rear of the building. Stickers with bar code numbers are affixed to each melon before the fruit is sorted into giant boxes. A forklift operator hauls the stacks to the corner of the building where the trucks park. There's no wasted movement, just as in the field.

"I hate to speak bad of local kids, but the conveyor wouldn't run anywhere near this smooth if they were working," Turbett says as a welcome breeze lifts the hair above his sunburned face. "The migrants are just the way to go. It's that simple."