Submitted article
Six members of the Colonel Crawford FFA chapter competed in the forestry contest at Camp Michael in Bucyrus on September 12, 2013. The chapter was proudly represented by Katie Cox, Dalton Hoover, Jessica Millenbaugh, Wyatt Caldwell, Bronwyn Leonhardt, and Wesley Wingert. All members were asked to identify trees, measure trees for the amount of possible lumber produced, chainsaw identification, and general knowledge of forestry.
On Thursday, September 19, 2013, thirty students from Colonel Crawford in partnership with Pioneer participated in the Crawford County soil judging contest. The Wynford and Buckeye Central FFA chapters also competed. There were two different types of soil judging, rural and urban soils. Judging the rural soils, that is for farming, they had to look at the slope, erosion, texture of soils, depth of roots and the drainage. After finding that information they decide the land capability, land use, and the recommended conservation practices.
While judging urban soils, those for buildings with basements, roads, septic tanks, and lawns and gardens, they had to judge slope, landform, flood hazard, soil stability, soil texture, depth of seasonal high water table, depth of bed rock, and if a hard dense layer is present. They then had to find the recommended management practices for building with basements, septic tanks absorption fields, driveways and local roads, and lawns, gardens, and landscaping.
The Colonel Crawford FFA chapter’s rural soil judging team placed second.The urban soil judging team placed third. Katie Cramer placed 2nd for the top 10 individuals in rural. The county soil judging contest was held in Crawford school district. All schools would like to thank the Crawford County Soil and Water Conservation for hosting and judging the Crawford County FFA soil judging contest.
The district soil judging contest was held in Richland County on Thursday, September 26. The members from the Colonel Crawford FFA chapter that competed for the district rural soil judging were Katie Cramer, Ashlie Hatcher, Shyanna Blevins and Cheyenne Johnson. The contestants for the urban soil judging team were Darren Thomas, Riley Erwin, Wesley Wingert, and Taylor Lutz. They judged four pits same as at the county contest along with a general knowledge and soils survey test.