John's long career in the industry has included district advisory work on a wide range of crops, specialisation in pipfruit and summerfruit as MAF's national specialist in these crops from 1975 to 1991, followed by predominantly specialist consultancy work focusing on the technical and crop husbandry aspects of growing these crops.

Included in this work has been field trial development work bringing new chemical thinning and growth regulator tools to the industry.

He has also been a regular contributor to the Orchardist magazine for almost 20 years.

John has extensive overseas experience in pipfruit production, and to a lesser extent summerfruit with consultancy experience in the United Kingdom, North and South America, South Africa and Australia. In addition, he has made regular study tours to the major European fruit growing areas.

John's areas of specialisation include:

• Crop husbandry and management.
• On-farm technical and crop husbandry supervision.
• Contract research.
• Impact reports on horticultural aspects of rural land subdivision.
• Pesticide data review for registration.
• Crop loss assessment.

Benchmarking for Intensive Orchard Production

Apple Chemical Thinning

Technical Consultant