Shaelei's first show

[scooby]

Well our first year went good, shaelei (10yr) did so good and i was so proud of her. and her lamb did fantastic. I think she did extremly well and the judge kept coming back and checking her out but you know, small town politics wins out again, and the livestock counsels kids won another year. but besides all that we had so much fun(besides the auction, tears,tears and more tears). we tried to pull her ewe out of auction to use her as a breeder but. i was unaware that you had to do this the day before the auction. So we had to let her go..Can't wait till next year...


Do you think she would have made a good breeder?

She weighed in at 120# she was alittle smaller but thats cause i had problems getting her sheared. so she didn't get sheared till july and we showed in august. So she was still weighing on the small end she definetly could have gained more.

Shaelei has a talent for setting and bracing

 

[aggieterpkatie]

Great job to your daughter! She's a nice ewe lamb, and as far as making a good breeder or not....the only thing I can pick on really is she's slightly cow-hocked. Her neck could possibly have a better set. That's getting nit-picky though. I used to raise market lambs (15 years ago, and boy have the club lambs changed! They're honestly so tubey now I can't really get excited over them, but that's what wins in the ring.

I know it's hard to sell that first lamb though! It gets easier! And can I just say THANK YOU for having a lamb that actually has a visible tail!!!! I HATE (with a passion) those ultra short docks.

 

[goodhors]

Congrats on getting thru your first Fair. That first Auction is always VERY hard, and we still cry when we say good-bye to the animals.

Sometimes in the ring, Judges catch things we miss. This year Judge wanted them BIG and FIT, made many comments about "mushy" feel to the animals. Our lambs look bow-legged in back to me! Daughter tells me that gives them more room for meat without rubbing. Wide hind end is better for cuts of meat. She is the lamb picker, chooses them from the seller's flock. She is pretty picky, does better each year. Discards quite a few before final choices to buy. I am not nearly as good in choices of lambs as daughter is. She goes out of town to buy, does not care for any of the local breeders body styles. And it does seem the breeders lambs either win top, or get nothing, while her lambs always get a placing.

She does always get a bit of tail, her breeder does not do the super short tails. That can cause problems later, with lambs anus coming out, breeding ewes dribbling poop and infecting themselves with no muscle control. Round, apple-butt look has lost most of it's followers around here. Causes too many problems in real life of the sheep.

Our Judges always take time to make comments, so kids know what he wants in his choices and why those are important to him. Did your Judge speak to kids at all? Might be something to mention in a note to the Fair Board, for choosing a Judge next year. If kids don't get comments, they don't know WHY things went the way they did. Even at shows, Judges make comments around here.

Our Fair Board always asks for ideas to improve the Fair, so specifics on Judges is a good request. The Horse Judges always give comments too. I am putting in a request for mulitiple drinking fountains! There just is no place to get a drink unless you buy it!

Oh yeah, if you miss the declaration of animal to sell cutoff, you COULD just buy her back yourself. You would have to pay sale expenses, but then just haul lamb home. We planned to buy daughter's calf if he didn't sell for his expenses. Lucky us, he sold for LOTS more than we said was the minimum we could take. Went to a new home.

 

[scooby]

We wanted to buy her back and i talk to the secretary at the livestock counter. I still am trying to figure out the way they do the auction around here but from what i can tell they place a minimum bid on your lamb like ours was $132 and then the bidders start at 100 and go up and this price is added to the minimum price. and then they have what you call boost card that can be purchased and added on or taken away from each individual child depending on what there animal made at auction, Confusing!!! this is how a lady explained it to us at the auction that has been doing it for over 20 years with her kids. so My daughters lamb went for i belive they bidded out at 150 so it should be about $280 she recieved if i'm understanding this right. o and you pay the Jr. livestock commitie and then they pay the child. they told us she wouldn't get her check till october. and in order to bid they said you had to pay a bidders fee on top of that to be able to bid.
So we had to let her go, i think we just all got so attached to her cause we lost our 14 yr old german sheperd about a 1 1/2 months after we got her so we put all our energy and love onto her. she was wonderfull with the kids loved playing chase with them and stuck to my daughter like glue, invited her self in the house, and cryed when we left ther in her pen, she was like a big dog. so ya i even cryed a bit, But it taught me a lesson better to do two then one. I think then they will stay a little more wild.
Other then that it was a great experience and it made her feel like she had accomplished something good. so hopefully she'll keep with it and it will get easyier.

aggieterpkatie i have to agree with you about the tails, i even thought our lambs tail was to short and then i saw alot of lambs at the show that had absoluty none and i must say i to don't agree with it not only for health issue but also i just think it looks rediculous.

the judge didn't make personal comments to the kids about what he did and didn't like but after looking all them over, he would just pick a few out of line to comment on about what he liked on them and infact during market he did talk about my daughters lamb and commented on her to a great degree and then picked two others to win market.
at our county fair theres probably about 150 to 200 lambs at the show. but the people around here can be very clickish so the grand champions and reserves are almost always the commities children, and that goes for the buyers around here to if they know you you get a good price if they dont you may get one bid and thats it. even the lady we talk to during the auction had said she hates doing the fair in this county cause of the favortism. but her kids love it so they continue which is what we will continue to do

 

[jhm47]

I would like to suggest that you look at other breeds of sheep. The club market lamb classes are very competitive, and there is a LOT of cheating that goes on in them. Our children showed purebred Columbias when they were in 4 - H, and did very well with them. If you show other breeds, you can show in the breeding classes, and possibly show the same animal for more than one year. I would not recommend Columbias, because they are huge, and they might be too large for your daughter. Look into Finns, Cheviot (possibly a bit flighty), or Southdowns. Any of these breeds should work for your daughter.

And---as to favoritism, I know that it exists, but it most likely is not as bad as you might think. Some of these families spend a LOT of $ on selecting their club lambs. They also have many years of "tricks" that they use to make their lambs look and feel better. I have witnessed lambs that were penned and not fed or watered for days before the show. This would "shrink" them and make them feel harder and more fit than the lambs that had been allowed to eat and drink. In my opinion, this is animal cruelty, and should not be allowed. There is also a drug that has been used to make them put on more muscle, and that has now been made illegal.

In my opinion, you are on the correct track with your daughter. You showed a lamb that she worked with, and whatever award she got is well deserved. This will serve her well later in her life. I've seen children whose parents bought them a club calf/lamb, they boarded the animal with a professional fitter, and the kid grabbed the halter seconds before the show and led the animal into the ring to get his/her award. These kids only learned that if you have the big $, you can buy yourself whatever you want. Whatever you do, don't let favoritism and lack of $ to buy these overbred animals make you quit. Good luck in the future!

 

[scooby]

Unfortunatly they do not do breeding classes here it is only showmanship and fitting and market that is done in our county, And around here i'm sure people spend alot of money on lambs I called a guy who is on the livstock commity he breeds and sells 4-h stock and does a little class for newcomers (which my daughter did take) and his lambs where $150. we went to another commity member and bought ours for $70. But see this guy that wanted $150 for his, he is the treasurer of the livestock commity and it was his kids that won and another commity members child.But he did help us at the classes answerd questions and his daughter was a great help to us, nice people. but favortism none the less. and it wasn't just lambs, pigs and steers too. I watched closely during the auction, her lamb went for a little over $400 dollars.
But we're not quiting, i could care less about the favoritism. as long as she likes doing it and it teaches her confidence and responsibility, i dont care, even if it takes money from my pocket, if she doesnt make her money back its ok. She's already talking about next year and didn't take off her livestock shirt the kids all got for a week. we had fun, she had fun. So its all good!