On Tuesday July 21^st, 2015, the University of Guelph OAC Weeds Team participated in the National Weed Science Contest hosted at The Ohio State University Research Farm located in South Charleston, Ohio.   This was a national contest with 25 Universities participating from throughout the United States.  A total of 63 teams participated, involving 200 students representing the North Central Weed Science Society, Northeastern Weed Science Society, Southern Weed Science Society, and the Western Society of Weed Science. Two graduate and four undergraduate teams from OAC competed in the competition.  The purpose of this contest was to provide students with an educational experience that tests their applied agronomic skills in the disciplines of crop protection and agronomy.

Awards were first distributed for team and individual performances within each regional society.  Within the Northeastern Weed Science Society the University of Guelph, undergraduate teams placed first and second and our graduate team placed third. The first place team consisted of Alex Vanhie, Jacob Nederend, Stephen Boersma and Joshua Burrows.  The second place team consisted of Dylan Magnus, Justin McNally, Johanna Burrows and Lauren Benoit.  The graduate team consisted of Chris Budd, Jordan Eyamie, Allison Taziar and Mike Schryver.  Top over all individual undergraduate performance awards were given to Stephen Boersma, Lauren Benoit and Johanna Burrows who placed first, second and third respectively.  The remaining students from the undergraduate and graduate teams competed well and placed competitively within their categories.

National Awards were then distributed to the top undergraduate and graduate teams overall.  The University of Guelph undergraduate teams placed second and third.  Team members that received national recognition in second place included Alex Vanhie, Jacob Nederend, Stephen Boersma and Joshua Burrows.  The third place team consisted of Dylan Magnus, Justin McNally, Johanna Burrows and Lauren Benoit.  Stephen Boersma placed second in the ranking for top undergraduate student at the competition.  These national awards recognized their outstanding performance in weed science and agronomy.

The OAC Weed Team was coached by Clarence Swanton and Darren Robinson.  Special thanks to Peter Smith, Mike Cowbrough, Eric Lyons, Francois Tardif, and Robert Moloney for their contributions to the success of the 2015 OAC Weeds Team.  The financial support of Syngenta Canada Inc., Monsanto Canada, Valent Canada Inc., Bayer CropScience , BASF, FMC Corporation, E.I. DuPont,  Nufarm Agriculture Inc., Dow AgroSciences,  Grain Farmers of Ontario and the Ontario Weed Committee is gratefully acknowledged.