My Endeavor at Spindletop Research Farm

My Endeavor at Spindletop Farm

            This summer I am interning under Chad Lee, Grain Crops Extension Specialist, with the hopes and efforts to learn more about Extension on the state level.  With having an Extension internship on the county level in Henderson County last summer and knowing what that entails, I wanted to further my experience in Extension this summer while learning and working on the Spindletop Research Farm in Lexington.

            If someone were to come up to me and ask if this summer is what I expected it to be thus far I would, with no hesitation, say no.  No one can fully prepare a person for exactly what they are diving into when starting a new job or internship, but in a sense I feel that this is what has made me grow the most, especially in Extension at the University of Kentucky.  Not knowing what to expect has allowed myself to work quick on my feet.  Working on a university research farm does not entail a set schedule.  You are always doing something different.  This is why I enjoy extension so much!

            Since I have started my internship, I have seen and learned many new things.  When starting the internship in May planting season was in full swing! Corn and soybeans were being drilled into the ground and fields were being sprayed daily.  So as any other person would have been, I was very overwhelmed when I started the job.  Growing up on my family farm was so much different than the research farm environment that I had walked into.  But sooner than later I caught on to things and came into full swing with everything that needed to be done.

            Over the course of the weeks I have performed various jobs such as planting corn and soybeans, labeling plots with stakes, performing many tests and measurements on plants, weighing out seeds and fertilizers to be applied, and many others things.  From doing all of these jobs, I have quickly learned that extension is very different between the county and state levels and, also, research farms are much different from family owned farms.  Research farms are very precise and consistent in everything they do and everything is done on a much smaller scale in order to achieve the preciseness needed. 

            Although I have learned many great hands on techniques on the research farm so far, I have to say that the people I work with are even better!  I could not learn and ask questions daily if it were not for the specialists and graduate students that I work with. Overall this summer has been a blast so far! I am so thankful for the opportunities that I have already had and I look forward to the ones to come!