Farmworkers and Laborers, Crop, Nursery, and Greenhouse
SOC 45-2092 · 2024-2034
Manually plant, cultivate, and harvest vegetables, fruits, nuts, horticultural specialties, and field crops. Use hand tools, such as shovels, trowels, hoes, tampers, pruning hooks, shears, and knives. Duties may include tilling soil and applying fertilizers; transplanting, weeding, thinning, or pruning crops; applying pesticides; or cleaning, grading, sorting, packing, and loading harvested products. May construct trellises, repair fences and farm buildings, or participate in irrigation activities.
How the U.S. Department of Labor describes this work. Published in English only.
Shrinking -2.1%
California projects this job will shrink over the next ten years. Fewer openings may mean a harder search.
What California expects of this job
- Typical pay in California
- $36,544per year
- Projected openings
- 373,450
- Projected change
- -2.1%
- Usually needs
- No formal educational credential
Skills this work uses most
O*NET, the U.S. Department of Labor's occupation database, rates how important each of these is to this work, and they are listed in that order, most important first. The ratings themselves are not shown, because the data carries the number without the scale it was measured on. The names are as published, in English.
- Speaking
- Operations Monitoring
- Active Listening
- Reading Comprehension
- Monitoring
- Writing
Pay by region
| Region | Typical pay in California | Projected openings |
|---|---|---|
| San Rafael MD (Marin County) | $49,700 | 240 |
| Napa MSA (Napa County) | $45,993 | 7,000 |
| Oakland-Fremont-Berkeley MD (Alameda and Contra Costa Counties) | $45,115 | 1,380 |
| San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara MSA (San Benito and Santa Clara Counties) | $45,108 | 2,760 |
| Santa Rosa-Petaluma MSA (Sonoma County) | $44,954 | 5,850 |
| San Francisco-San Mateo-Redwood City MD (San Francisco and San Mateo Counties) | $44,640 | 1,170 |
| Vallejo MSA (Solano County) | $40,888 | 820 |
| Redding MSA (Shasta County) | $39,920 | 260 |
| Anaheim-Santa Ana-Irvine MD (Orange County) | $39,467 | 2,040 |
| Los Angeles-Long Beach-Glendale MD (Los Angeles County) | $39,462 | 4,370 |
| Santa Cruz-Watsonville MSA (Santa Cruz County) | $38,602 | 4,710 |
| North Coast Region (Del Norte, Humboldt, Lake, and Mendocino Counties) | $38,541 | 3,020 |
| Salinas MSA (Monterey County) | $38,479 | 63,830 |
| San Luis Obispo-Paso Robles MSA (San Luis Obispo County) | $38,098 | 4,790 |
| San Diego-Chula Vista-Carlsbad MSA (San Diego County) | $38,046 | 6,790 |
| North Valley-Northern Mountains Region (Colusa, Glenn, Lassen, Modoc, Nevada, Plumas, Sierra, Siskiyou, Tehama, and Trinity Counties) | $37,933 | 5,970 |
| Sacramento-Roseville-Folsom MSA (El Dorado, Placer, Sacramento, and Yolo Counties) | $37,799 | 8,120 |
| Santa Maria-Santa Barbara MSA (Santa Barbara County) | $37,799 | 34,680 |
| Eastern Sierra-Mother Lode Region (Alpine, Amador, Calaveras, Inyo, Mariposa, Mono, and Tuolumne Counties) | $37,645 | 500 |
| El Centro MSA (Imperial County) | $37,470 | 7,120 |
| Oxnard-Thousand Oaks-Ventura MSA (Ventura County) | $37,418 | 20,960 |
| Stockton-Lodi MSA (San Joaquin County) | $36,883 | 9,710 |
| Yuba City MSA (Sutter and Yuba Counties) | $36,811 | 3,300 |
| Hanford-Corcoran MSA (Kings County) | $36,770 | 4,910 |
| Chico MSA (Butte County) | $36,533 | 1,570 |
| Merced MSA (Merced County) | $36,451 | 9,390 |
| Modesto MSA (Stanislaus County) | $36,451 | 9,720 |
| Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario MSA (Riverside and San Bernardino Counties) | $36,183 | 10,220 |
| Bakersfield-Delano MSA (Kern County) | $36,121 | 67,570 |
| Visalia MSA (Tulare County) | $36,080 | 36,250 |
| Fresno MSA (Fresno and Madera Counties) | $35,813 | 53,830 |
What the pay actually ranges across
- The lowest-paid tenth earn under
- $35,250
- A quarter earn under
- $35,424
- Half earn under
- $36,544
- Three quarters earn under
- $38,649
- The highest-paid tenth earn over
- $46,086
A median is one point. These are the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics' 2026 figures for California, and they say how far apart the people doing this job actually are. Read them as the spread across everyone already in the work — not as a starting wage and not as a promise about where anyone lands.
Similar work
O*NET, the U.S. Department of Labor's occupation database, names these as occupations involving work similar to this one — its own reading of the job, not a grouping by code. They keep O*NET's order, and only those California publishes a projection for are shown.
| Occupation | Typical pay in California | Projected openings | Projected change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Agricultural Equipment Operators | $39,872 | 26,200 | +7.4% |
| Farmworkers, Farm, Ranch, and Aquacultural Animals | $39,687 | 26,520 | +0.6% |
| Graders and Sorters, Agricultural Products | $37,314 | 11,300 | -5.7% |
| Landscaping and Groundskeeping Workers | $46,714 | 182,080 | +5.8% |
| Pesticide Handlers, Sprayers, and Applicators, Vegetation | $46,212 | 3,870 | +3.6% |
| Forest and Conservation Workers | $44,863 | 5,760 | 0% |
Programs that train for this job — 2
Horticulture: Nursery Technician Certificate of Accomplishment
Diablo Valley College · Pleasant Hill · $1,096
Horticulture: Nursery and Greenhouse Certificate of Achievement
Diablo Valley College · Pleasant Hill · $2,180