Australian Soil Judging Competition just as much about education as it is about competing

Run by Soil Science Australia, the competition consisted of two days training on how to interpret soil profiles and one day of judging.

The SA team, consisting of Birhanu Iticha, Kate Matthews, Nathan Strawbridge, Alex Busch and Alex Mackenzie, was coached by TERN soil scientist Luke Finn.

Soil Science Australia federal president, and SA soil scientist, Ed Scott said the competition was just as much as education as it was about competing.

"It's designed to give students exposure to soils in the landscape, which gives them a better understanding of how the soils operate in the landscape and how to better manage those soils," he said.

"It's a high rainfall environment in Darwin, up to 1.7 metres of rain, so there was very different soils than what you'd see in SA.

"They judged kandosol and hydrosol soils, which only have a gradual change in texture and look relatively uniform down the profile, unlike in SA where we have a lot of texture contrast like sand over clay."

Dr Scott said many second and third year university students participated in the competition, with "no one involved looking at soils the same".

"A lot have chosen to do further research or work with more of a soils focus because of the competition."

Emily Leyden, a soil scientist and research fellow at University of Adelaide, finished third in the early careers section and said the competition was an exceptional networking and skills building experience.

Dr Leyden previously competed in 2019 and 2021 when doing her PhD, and has organised student teams to travel to the competition in the past two years while also taking part in the early careers section.

"We're trying to build a soils community amongst young people, especially students from University of Adelaide and Uni SA," she said.

"The soils judging competition is all about increasing hands-on learning experiences. Soils is something you've got to learn about out in the field. You've got to see where it is, where it has come from and by looking at that as a whole you can start to classify it.

"That classification can give you an idea about production limitations or production benefits. Understanding your soil is the key to understanding your production and how you can get the most out of it."

Dr Leyden said the Australian Soil Judging Competition was the premier learning experience for tertiary students across Australia, and also offered great networking opportunities between students and senior research scientists across a variety of fields.

She said she took any opportunity to learn from experts in the field.

"In my job day-to-day I have limited exposure to soil pits so I try take every opportunity to get myself in a pit because you always learn something new in a pit.

"The people we're learning from have been in 6000, 7000 soil pits so you really start to be an expert."

The SA contingent of competitors wished to thank its sponsors for making the trip possible. They were Grain Producers SA, Royal Show Society Education Fund, the Fertiliser Technology Research Centre, the Biogeochemical Research Group and the Soil Ecology Group.

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