The Southland Science and Technology fair got under way as pupils showed their projects and hoped they had pleased the judges.
One who had been in the winners circle before was Amelia Frew, 13, of St John’s Girls School.
She was looking to go back to back but knew it would tough to repeat.
"Last year my friend and I entered the competition and we placed gold so we were very proud of our project," she said.
"This year’s project is about an environmentally friendly way of getting rid of grass grub."
The grass grub project was one of 167 entries, from 16 schools, entered into the Science and Technology Fair held at the Invercargill Working Mens Club.
Fair committee member Sharon Taylor said the theme this year was natural Murihiku and she was hoping pupils would explore the ecology side of things.
There had been a lot of projects on milk this year.
They had been collecting data from their own farms, from their own cows, so that had been really interesting.
Results from the fair will be announced at an awards ceremony this Friday evening.
