Despite being her first time out, FFA member Taylor Peters placed fifth out of 100 junior livestock judging students at the 2023 Northern International Livestock Exposition (NILE) competition Oct. 16-17 held in Billings, Montana.

“I was surprised for sure,” she said. “I went into it just wanting to get some experience and learn what I had to work on. So I didn’t have high expectations at all. I just wanted to feel kind of prepared going into the arena, which I did. But I was definitely very surprised.”

Peters wasn’t the only FFA student to do well last month. Between Oct. 16-20 Powell-Shoshone FFA members attended NILE and Cowboy Classic in Laramie — both competitions served as the first of the season for Powell-Shoshone FFA members, although some students did compete in both.

Between the two competitions, eight students and seven teams placed within the top 10. At NILE the following top 10 placements were earned according to competition results: Katie Morrison placed seventh in senior livestock judging, the junior livestock judging team placed third; Peters finished fifth in junior livestock judging; the senior horse judging team placed seventh; Tanis Ginest placed 10th in senior horse judging and the junior horse judging team placed seventh. 

At the Cowboy Classic the following top 10 placements were earned: Powell’s ag mechanics team placed second; Weston Reynolds placed fifth in ag mechanics; Wyatt Heffington placed eighth in ag mechanics; Powell’s senior horse judging Team 2 placed third; Powell’s senior horse judging Team 1 placed fourth; Powell senior horse judging Team 3 placed eighth; Charlotte Heffington placed fifth in senior horse judging and Juliana Marquez placed ninth in senior horse judging.

“For it being their first ever contest, I think they did really good,” Morrison said. “A lot of the kids didn’t have a lot of experience, but I think it went pretty well. Taylor placed fifth with not much experience, so I think that’s really cool.”

Wyatt, who placed eighth out of 28 students at the Cowboy Classic in ag mechanics and was on the second place team in the same category, had not had the opportunity to attend the competition before.

“We definitely competed,” Wyatt said. “It’s the first competition of the year so we still got room to grow, but it’s looking good.”

Powell High School’s new FFA adviser Ben Curdy applauded the students’ performance individually and as teams. Curdy, who was an adviser for seven years in North Dakota, had told the students that the first one to two competitions are about gaining experience.

“Going forward they’re going to be able to apply that in their practices in a way that I think will really help them progress individually,” Curdy said. “So I expect to see a lot of moving up through the ranks as they continue to compete this year.”