Citrus acumen on display
Monache’s Keller is individual champion
Twenty-eight FFA citrus judging teams representing 16 chapters put their knowledge of citrus fruit and the citrus industry to work on Saturday at the Porterville Fairgrounds. This was the second year for the competition. Teams from throughout the citrus belt and as far away as Santa Maria, Arvin and Reedley competed for awards sponsored by the citrus industry and the Porterville College Aggies.
Trophies were donated by Bob Mailand, former agriculture instructor and citrus coach from Porterville High School.
Woodlake FFA won the A team overall, followed by Golden West, Minerets-o’neils, Monache and Pioneer Valley-santa Maria.
Monache blue won the B team overall, followed by Monache silver, Monache gold, Arvin gold and Minerets-o’neils.
Monache first-year contestant Jenna Keller took the top individual honors in the B team category and for the entire contest.
Pia Martinez placed first in the A team individual category, followed by Donovan Nelson, Nicholas Patton, Mckenna Rogers and Michael Rezendo. In the B team individual category following Keller were Stacey Van Scoy, Chandler Barcellos, Brianna Martinez and J.J. Palafox.
Each FFA team, consisting of three to four FFA members, judged eight citrus classes and gave three sets of reasons or rationales justifying their placing to citrus industry leaders.
FFA competitors judged two classes of navel oranges, two classes of lemons, two classes of ruby grapefruit, a class of young citrus trees in addition to an identification class consisting of 20 samples of damages or diseased fruit found in the industry today.
Oral reasons were presented
on the orange, grapefruit and tree classes and were scored by citrus industry representatives who also spent the day before setting up a challenging, high quality and educational judging experience for the FFA students.
“To ‘Learn by Doing’ through the rigors of competition in the FFA is an important goal in ag education as well as developing a student’s ability to make decisions and communicate effectively,” said Nate Laux, a citrus industry volunteer.
The following judges, contributors and sponsors for the contest were: Dennis Laux, Nate Laux,
Greg Galloway, Jeff Galloway, Matt Watkins, Alan and Neil Job, Billy Bennett, Roger Smith and Ray Swearingen, Steve Scarborough and Sally Mailand and Linda Hill, who donated countless hours and expertise and funding to make the PC Aggies and the Orange Belt Citrus Industries Citrus Contest a success.
The following 16 FFA chapters participated: Arvin, Central Valley Christian, Exeter, Golden West, Hanford, Lemoore, Minerets-o’neils, Monache, Mt. Whitney, North-bakersfield, Porterville, Pioneer Highsanta Maria, Reedley, Strathmore and Woodlake.