Head Gardener

Qualifications

The ideal candidate has:

· Extensive horticultural and field experience

· An understanding of ornamental horticulture with strong tree and plant skills

· Plant and pest identification, hand pruning, tree and plant installation and maintenance.

· The ability to work independently and to manage a team.

· An energetic, assertive, self-managed, honest approach to hard work and a desire to learn.

· Strong management and communication skills required to oversee a team, a number of contractors, and employers who are rarely on-site.

Description

Indian Bean is a Henry County, KY, garden and farm seeking an individual to join and lead our gardening and horticulture team. Indian Bean is a 400-acre farm with diverse horticultural variety. There is a formal walled garden that includes a perennial border and seasonable beds for intensively planted vegetables and cut flowers. Great attention is given to the ongoing care of annuals, vines and rose and shrub plantings. Elements of the outer garden include an apple and stone fruit orchard, an enclosed berry garden, an expanded auxiliary vegetable garden, as well as a woodland garden. In addition, there are heavily landscaped hedgerows, a grove of mock oranges and shrub roses, adjacent woodlands and developing timber stands, 2 ponds and an extensive collection of daffodil plantings throughout the meadows. Additionally, there are currently native grass stands and wildflower-dominant meadows surrounding the walled garden.

Job Duties

This is a 40-hour per week position Monday-Friday. The Head Gardener is an active gardener while also managing several other part-time gardeners and contractors and sharing oversight over a natural landscape manager. Responsibilities include:

· Perennial garden maintenance including installations, deadheading, staking, weeding, fertilizing, mulching, cutting back spent flowers

· Vegetable garden installation, plant install, seeding, thinning, trellis building, harvesting

· Turf Care

· Tree and shrub installations and maintenance

· Soil management and pest and disease control. Monitoring and managing soil quality and identifying and managing pests and diseases that may affect plants. Studying and applying knowledge about various control methods with a preference for chemical-free options.

· Work with native-plant consultants and partners on native grass maintenance, including prescribed burns and on wildflower meadow plantings

· Ability to operate tractors, mowers, landscaping equipment, power tools

· Ability to oversee irrigation maintenance and assist as needed

· Ability to manage a range of other direct reports on priorities and weekly schedules

· Complete written job day sheets of tasks performed and material lists

· Overseeing propagation of annuals and vegetables by outsiders

· Developing and managing a schedule and seasonal timetable for garden maintenance tasks

· Working closely with outside consultants including landscape designers and other contractors.

· Flexible and willingness to be a “jack of all trades” (including responsibility for on-site coordination of some household tasks) with a strong attention to detail.

· Overseeing work on our garden and yard in town (a 1/3-acre site in Louisville with a focus on potted flowers, one flower bed, and generally lower-maintenance plantings, together with managing forced bulbs and supplying firewood throughout the winter.

Benefits

Benefits include:

· PTO of 3 weeks per year.

· 7 paid holidays

· Maternity/parental and wellness/caregiving leave policy

· Health, dental and vision insurance

· Contributions to retirement accounts

· Ongoing professional development

· Possibility of providing housing

There are several additional workers who report to the Head Gardener, including 2-3 part-time gardeners who work different numbers of days, some seasonally. The Head Gardener also oversees a number of independent contractors (for turf maintenance, seed propagation, grass-cutting, etc.) and oversees work on the employer’s primary resident in Louisville – a 1/3-acre site in the Louisville with a focus on potted flowers, one flower bed and generally lower-maintenance plantings.

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Head Gardener