Ag student following family footsteps
Student settles for an agricultural career path
HORTICULTURE is something of a family tradition for Tasmania’s Jack Bartels.
His grandfather was an apple farmer, his dad is an apple and cherry orchard manager and Jack picked his first cherry for a wage as a 13-year-old.
“I think my greatgrandfather was in blueberries, too,” adds the now 22-year-old from the picturesque Huon Valley.
“I grew up playing around my Grandad’s orchard and started working in horticulture when I was 13, picking cherries and working in cherry sheds as a summer job.
“I think that’s what sparked my interest.”
At 17, Jack started studying teaching at university, but soon realised life at the front of the classroom was not for him.
Instead, he returned to Hansen Orchards and, after one-and-a-half years there working as a farm hand and being taken under the boss’s wing, he was sent back to school to get his degree.
“I do have a job to go back to there, but they’re pretty keen for me to get some extra experience and we’ve talked about me going to New Zealand for apples, or to Canada for cherries to see how other businesses operate and see what we could bring back here,” Jack says.
“That’s the part that interests me. I’d like to stay within horticulture, it’s definitely my passion, but I’d like to move into the business side of things.
“There’s so much opportunity, especially with apples and cherries.
“The workforce is getting older and quite a lot of practices are a bit old-fashioned, so it’s exciting for us young people to get involved and progressing them into the future with new technologies.”
I grew playing up around my Grandad’s orchard... — Jack Bartels