Arrival in Morgantown

Team Building Exercise

After an approximately 16-hour drive from St. Paul (with an overnight stay in Farmer City, IL) the University of Minnesota Soils Team has made its debut in West Virginia. It has so far been a rousing success, as we found the hotel bar and a liquor store in less than an hour after arrival. We can only hope this streak continues throughout the rest of the week and competition.

It was a pleasant and productive trip, with the more ambitious members completing schoolwork and the less ambitious taking naps. But between homework and sleeping, there was plenty of time to review a number of soil surveys and descriptions.

Pictured: Melissa and Tom studying
Not pictured: Katie sleeping

While a helpful review, these raised more questions than answers, such as, "What is a Dystrudept?", "What are channers?", "The nail isn't at the bottom of the third horizon? It's just anywhere in that horizon? Are you kidding me?! Is this a joke?". That last one was a real shock to all of us.

The next few days will be spent studying the practice pits and expanding our list of soil science pick-up lines.