1. K-State Crops Team Claims Sixth Straight National Championship
The Collegiate Crops Team recently captured the title of national champion for the sixth year in a row. K-State teams have now won the collegiate crops contest championship in 13 of the past 16 years. To win the 2014 national title, the team won both the Kansas City American Royal Collegiate Crops Contest on Nov. 18 and the Chicago Collegiate Crops Contest on Nov. 22.
Official members of the K-State team were Sam Knauss, Paola; Tyler Herrs, Linn; and Ben Coomes, Girard — all juniors majoring in agronomy. Alternates for both contests were Samantha L’Ecuyer, Morrowville, sophomore in agronomy, and Michaela Simmelink, Downs, senior in animal sciences and industry. Hayden Guetterman, Bucyrus, sophomore in agronomy, was also an alternate in Kansas City.
At Kansas City, the K-State team placed first in all three phases of the contest: plant-and-seed identification, grain grading, and seed analysis. At Chicago, they were first in identification and grain grading, and second in seed analysis. Individually, the three K-State team members placed 1-2-3 in Kansas City, posting the highest team score since Texas Tech University in 1965 in this contest. All three were also in the top five in Chicago.
Sam Knauss led the K-State team with a first place sweep of both Kansas City and Chicago. In doing so, he also placed first in all three components in both contests, a result that has never been accomplished in the 81-year history that both contests have been held. His total score of 1794/1800 in Kansas City was the highest individual performance there since 1965.
Ben Coomes was second overall in Kansas City and fifth in Chicago. He placed third in all three components in Kansas City. At Chicago, he was third in identification, fourth in grain grading, and fifth in seed analysis.
Tyler Herrs finished third in Kansas City and fourth in Chicago. At Kansas City, he placed second in identification and seed analysis and fourth in grain grading. At Chicago, he was fourth in identification and analysis and fifth in grain grading.
The team was coached by Kevin Donnelly, K-State professor of agronomy.
The American Royal coordinated the Kansas City contest, with CHS Foundation as the primary financial sponsor. Additional sponsors were the American Society of Agronomy, DuPont Pioneer, and the South Dakota Crop Improvement Association.
The primary sponsor of the Chicago contest was the CME Group. Additional donors in Chicago included the Crop Science Society of America, Growmark Cooperative, and the Society of Commercial Seed Technologists.
Locally, sponsors for the K-State Crops Team include the Kansas Crop Improvement Association, Department of Agronomy, and the K-State Student Government Association.
2. K-State Crops Team Wins Australian Universities Crops Competition
Six members of the Collegiate Crops Team made a study trip to Australia in September 2014 where they competed in the Australian Universities Crops Competition. The event was hosted by the Australian Grain Growers organization in Temora, New South Wales. The K-State team traveled with an Iowa State University Crops Team, which also participated in the competition.
K-State Crops Team members making the trip included Katrina Sudbeck, Seneca; Ben Coomes, Girard; Nathan Larson, Kensington; Sam Knauss, Paola; Tyler Herrs, Linn; and Jeri Sigle, Council Grove. The team is coached by Kevin Donnelly, professor of agronomy.
The K-State team took first place in the contest, led by Katrina Sudbeck, who took the top individual overall award, and Ben Coomes, who placed second. As top individual, Sudbeck will also have the opportunity to travel to Asia with Grain Growers on a grain marketing trip in February, 2015. Iowa State University placed second in the contest, followed by Sydney University. Five other agricultural universities across southern and western Australia competed.
This was the second time the K-State team was invited to participate in the Australian crops competition.
The competition was held over two days at the Temora Agricultural Innovation Centre, managed by FarmLink. The contest included a seed identification component, tests over Australian cereal, pulse, and oilseed production and quality, commercial grading of wheat, a business management problem, field yield estimates and management recommendations, and a live crop, weed and disease evaluation component.
Before and after the competition, contestants also toured various research projects being conducted on site and at farms in the local area. Learning about Australian white wheat and canola production, ryegrass herbicide resistance problems, and the use of pulse crops such as lupins in crop rotations were highlights for the U.S. teams.
The students also took the opportunity to learn more about Australia. The trip began with visits to popular sites in Sydney, followed by a trip to the Great Barrier Reef at Cairns. On the trip to Temora, the group visited the Blue Mountains outside of Sydney, followed by a farm tour hosted by Grain Growers board member Richard Rice in Parkes, NSW. The farm featured integration of sheep production with wheat and canola cropping systems.
After the competition, they visited Charles Sturt University and the EH Graham Centre for Agricultural Innovation Field Station at Wagga Wagga, NSW. The final day was spent at the family farm of board member Gerry Lane near Lockhart, NSW, which featured extensive barley and faba bean production under flood irrigation.
The trip was made possible by a generous grant from the CHS Foundation to both K-State and ISU. In addition, the Kansas Wheat Commission and the K-State Department of Agronomy supported team travel expenses. The College of Agriculture provided international travel scholarships to the Kansas State students.
