Envirothon Problem-Solving

Editors: An intensive human interest story will unfold tomorrow at the Canon Envirothon at Mount St. Mary's College in Emmitsburg, Maryland.

Photo opportunities include:

1. The final five presentations. The media is invited to attend this event only if they don't compromise the students as they get ready to give their final presentations. Once a presentation begins, the doors are locked for 40 minutes until the presentation and questions/answers are completed. The presentations will begin at 2 PM and take place every half hour until completed.

2. Closing ceremony where the top teams will be announced. First, second, and third place will receive scholarships to any college so the competition is fierce. At the end, there are tears, squealing, and all the emotion that comes from teenagers who have worked all year to achieve a top winner position from a challenging competition: the Canon Envirothon.

I have attached a backgrounder of the problem that has been set up for the students and what will happen over the next 24 hours.

If you want to consider this story for your audience and need special accommodations, please call the Envirothon "war room" at 301-447-5914 and ask for Beth Horsey or Kathleen Diehl.

Envirothon Problem-Solving Involves Agricultural Land Preservation

EMMITSBURG, Md. - August 30, 2003- High school students participating in the Canon Envirothon, the largest natural resource competition in North America, were presented with the biggest challenge of their young lives: a role-playing, problem-solving problem that involves the conservation and preservation of a local Frederick County family farm. The students visited the Zene and Audrey Wolfe farm for testing on Sunday, and it is that farm that is being used for the second part of the competition. On Monday, the students completed the first part of the competition with a hands-on, comprehensive testing of natural resource concepts in soils, forestry, wildlife, aquatics, and an environmental issue. For the 2002/2003 school year, the environmental issue has been agricultural conservation and preservation.

There are a total of 41 teams of high school-aged students from the United States and six teams from the Canadian Provinces participating in the Canon Envirothon. It is being held this summer at Mount St. Mary's College in Emmitsburg, Maryland. Before they arrived for the National Envirothon, they had studied the five areas of the Envirothon in their own states and many have competed at the county and state levels. Students at the Canon Envirothon are the winners of their state and province competition.

In the final phase of the Envirothon, students have been asked to take on the role of the Frederick County Agricultural Commission and develop a plan for the conservation and preservation of the Wolfe farm. The Wolfe's raise 60 Black Angus beef cows on their 133 acre farm. They also raise hay to feed the cows. Because of the drought last year and the rain this year, the hay they so sorely need has mostly been lost, threatening the profitability of their operation and their way of life.

The Wolfe's want to continue farming full time and their son would also like to take over the farm in a couple of years. They need to be able to raise the money to cover their bills and the costs of running the farm. They find themselves at a crossroad where they need to begin looking at options.

Environthon students spent the morning listening to and talking to three farmers who have been at similar crossroads and have made some decisions that have made a difference in their farming operations. They went first to Twin Oaks Dairy in Emmitsburg to talk to Jeff Wivell whose family has lived and worked on the farm for many generations. Wivell milks 500 cows and used to also grow grain crops to feed them. He has taken on a partner/farmer, Mark Potter, and together they are trying many new farming ideas. He told the students that he now has mostly quit growing crops and works with other farmers to supply what he needs to feed his cows. In return, he negotiates with these farmers for an exchange for his manure. They are also working with various universities and the Dairy Herd Improvement Association (DHIA) with research projects to monitor various ways to improve the quality and quantity of their milk production and to decrease nitrogen and phosphorous in manure. Wivell and Potter told the students that milk prices are at a 35 year low right now and that they can make more money from composted manure than from milk. Wivell has put his portions of the family farm into agricultural land preservation.

The students then traveled to the Catoctin Mountain Orchard and had a tour of this operation with Robert Black. The orchard is also a family operation that has undergone ups and downs in production and market demand. Black gave the students a brief history of the orchard and talked about future access threats to his operation from the redesign of Maryland Route 15 to the Catoctin Scenic Highway. He gave an overview of how he manages his farm and how he attempts to use management practices like rotation of trees to vegetables and using a system of underground irrigation that delivers fertilizer directly to plant roots and not the entire field. Practices such as these are designed to slow down the runoff from the farm to nearby water systems.

Students are taking the ideas from these farmers, the knowledge they have gained over the past school year, and their training from their state and the international Envirothons to come up with a plan for the Wolfe Farm. This plan may include preservation options, various conservation management practices that include everything from diversifying livestock or crops, renting to another farmer, tree farms, government programs, to no change at all. They must prepare a 20 minute presentation that they will deliver on July 31st to a panel of judges who are agency experts, educators and environmental professionals who will listen to each presentation. The presentation must be delivered by all team members, they must justify their recommendations, and they must prepare two visual aids to support their presentation.

There will be five teams chosen to deliver their presentations again to a new set of judges beginning at 2 PM. From that, a first, second and third place team will be chosen and announced at the closing ceremony tomorrow night beginning at 7 PM. Teams placing first - tenth overall receive a trophy or plaque appropriate for display. A non-monetary award is awarded to the team that receives the highest score on the test for each of the five testing categories and the preliminary oral presentation. Teams placing first, second, or third place in the competition receive scholarship money to attend a university, college, or trade school of their choice The Envirothon mission is to develop knowledgeable, skilled and dedicated citizens who are willing and prepared to work towards achieving and maintaining a natural balance between the quality of life and the quality of the environment. In many states, it is sponsored by many federal, state, and local groups and organizations with missions to conserve natural resources including local Soil/Natural Resource Conservation Districts who are the lead sponsor, the USDA Natural Resource Conservation Service, the USDA Forest Service, U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, the Environmental Protection Agency, state departments of agriculture, state departments of natural resources, Audubon, Izzak Walton League, National Wildlife Federation and town/community natural resources agencies and groups.

National Canon Envirothon Begins Today In Maryland

EMMITSBURG, Md. July 25, 2003 -- Imagine this: a young teenaged girl walks up to a glassed caged and successfully identifies a wriggling snake inside as an Eastern Rattler. She doesn't flinch, squeal, or giggle. Impossible? Improbable? Never Happen?

For participants at the International Canon Envirothon, who are arriving today from 41 United States and six Canadian Provinces, that and many more animals, plants, types of soil and trees will be easily identified. High school-aged students have spent the 2002/2003 school season studying forestry, soils, wildlife, aquatics and an environmental issue-agricultural land preservation and conservation this year-in preparation of representing their states and provinces at this annual competition.

The Envirothon mission is to develop knowledgeable, skilled and dedicated citizens who are willing and prepared to work towards achieving and maintaining a natural balance between the quality of life and the quality of the environment. Students from high schools and youth clubs such as 4-H, Boy and Girl Scouts and FFA, work in teams of five with a coach to study basic concepts of natural resources and the environment. In most states, they compete from their schools to move forward to the county Envirothon and move forward from that to the state event. Winners of the State Envirothon are arriving today to compete for the national championship.

Conducted over five consecutive days the Envirothon is comprised of five training /testing stations and an oral presentation component. This year the student presentations will be around a problem set up around agricultural land preservation. At the testing stations and the oral presentation, each team's performance is evaluated and scored by individuals with field expertise. There will be 75 judges who are agency experts, educators and environmental professionals who will listen to each presentation, choose five top teams and then judge those five team presentations again.

At the conclusion of the second round of presentations, scores are combined for final ranking and award/prize distribution. Teams placing First - Tenth overall receive a trophy or plaque appropriate for display. A non-monetary award is awarded to the team that receives the highest score on the test for each of the five testing categories and the preliminary oral presentation. Teams placing First, Second, or Third Place in the competition receive scholarship money to attend a university, college, or trade school of their choice.

The campus of Mount St. Mary's College is decorated with Envirothon banners and staff from Maryland's federal, state, and local agencies and organizations are poised to welcome 245 students and their coaches.

And the Eastern rattler? He-or is it a she? -is waiting along with the soils pit, the brown bats, the bird calls, the forest floor decomposters, the microinvertibrates, --well you get the idea.

- 30 -

Delmarva Farmer Story - May 13, 2003

2003 Kickoff Luncheon Held

The Maryland Envirothon Steering Committee along with the Maryland Association of Soil Conservation Districts
(MASCD) held a "Kickoff Luncheon" at the annual MASCD meeting in Annapolis, MD.
on Monday January 27. The Noontime event was held at the Raddison Hotel.

Robert Wilson (left), President of the Maryland Association of Soil Conservation Districts
with Clay Burns (right) Executive Director of the Canon Envirothon during the 2003 Kickoff Luncheon