PILOT ROCK, Ore. — So what’s in a hole in the ground?

Interesting and healthy soil, if you ask students from 11 high schools and some soil scientists who shepherded them around the Terry Hamby farm in Pilot Rock on Sept. 26.

The students challenged each other in a kind of soil beauty contest.

“We’re hosting a soil judging contest,” said Nancy Weinke, who teaches agriculture at Pilot Rock High School. “We just started school here a couple weeks ago, but we go over the aspects of different types of soil, and then the pits show different horizons that are within an area, how different soils can be such a short distance away. Usually there’s a pit made that’s 5-7 feet deep, and you can see different horizons which are layers the soil has been laid down in, and what it’s made up of.”

The students had a practice pit and three separate pits for official examination and scoring. The task was to document their observations on score cards that were evaluated for accuracy.

Pilot Rock High School has two faculty who teach agriculture. Weinke and her husband also raise cattle and hay.

“Alan Wernsing is going to talk about the third pit and explain what the students saw and what they should have found,” Weinke said. “We do that on each event.”

Was the third pit a good location?

“I’m kind of looking at the rocks there,” Weinke said. “The top layer’s not too bad.”

Wernsing was prepared with dozens of his observations about the third soil pit. He discussed what was to be found in the several layers, soil color, texture, composition, pH measurement, permeability, topography, water erosion, and still dozens of additional possible observations the students might notice and record.

The best thing about running this field trial, he said, is getting students into the field.

“It gets the kids out, gets them in touch with agriculture,” he said, “especially with some of the kids who have spent their lives in town, they don’t get a chance to see agriculture that much.”

According to husband and wife soil scientist team, Mark and Pam Keller, there is plenty of pride to be taken in local soil.

“These are fantastic soils,” Mark Keller said. “Iowa also has fantastic soil.”

“I would say this is some of the best soil in the world right here,” Pam Keller said, “and we need to keep every bit of it.”

The high school students enjoyed the field exercise.

“I enjoy learning about different careers in agriculture,” said Claire Stratton, 17, a senior at Stanfield Secondary School. “I like livestock judging because I want to get into ranching.”

Packing the event with exposure to agriculture careers was part of the strategy of organizer Don Wysocki, extension soil scientist for Oregon State University in Pendleton. The students were able to observe and learn from soil scientists.

“If you’re in agriculture, you don’t have to be a farmer,” Wysocki said. “You can be a professional in some field that relates to agriculture. My objective is to expose them to these other professions that relate to agriculture, so if they don’t end up being on the farm, they have these other opportunities, they see that there are people actually making a living doing related work.”

The field trial was a competition among Blue Mountain FFA classes representing high schools from Echo, Heppner, Hermiston, Ione, Irrigon, Mac High, Pendleton, Pilot Rock, Riverside, Stanfield and Weston-McEwen.

The students were divided into beginner and advanced groups, which roughly match freshman and sophomore levels for beginners, and junior and senior levels for advanced.

In the beginner category, Heppner had top score of 291, Pilot Rock was second at 287, Echo was third at 256, Weston-McEwen was fourth at 254, and Mac High placed fifth at 220.

In the advanced grouping, Hermiston placed first at 339, Heppner was second at 323, Pendleton scored third at 321, Irrigon placed fourth at 282, and Ione finished fifth at 265.

Top overall scorer in the beginner bracket was Hailey Thieme of Pilot Rock with 117, and finishing first in the advanced category was Austyn Katsel of Hermiston with 121.

“Just about everything we do relates to the soil,” Wysocki said. “You build homes on it, you produce food on it, you discharge your waste into it, it purifies water. So if you have a well, it’s dryfiltered through the soil. Soil is probably the most critical natural resource we have.”