By Mike Isbell
University of Georgia
I don’t drink coffee at night. But I did at the State Livestock
Show at the Georgia National Fairground in Perry, Ga.
That was the night north Georgia got snow, west Georgia got mixed
snow and sleet and Perry got ice-cold rain. Even with thermal
underwear, sweater, insulated coat, rain parka and a hat on, I
thought I was going to freeze to death.
But I wasn’t the only one freezing.
Almost 2,000 4-H Club and FFA members from all over Georgia were
at the livestock show from Wednesday through Sunday. They were
showing some beautiful cattle, sheep and, if you can call a hog
beautiful, hogs.
And they were all cold.
Chilly job
My job Wednesday night was helping check in more than 600
breeding heifers. I spent about 3 hours sitting in a huge metal
barn, checking the registration papers and ear tattoos of black
Angus, red Angus, Charolais and Hereford show cattle. Other
cattle breeds were checked in the same way.
If the tattoo number on the registration paper matched the number
in the heifer’s ear and the registration paper and entry form
matched, the 4-H or FFA member owning that heifer got a
contestant number to compete in the breeding heifer show on
Thursday and Friday.
In all, 279 steers, 221 dairy heifers, 77 breeding ewes, and
1,300 hogs were checked into the show on Wednesday and
Thursday.
In spite of the cold rain, these 4-H and FFA members kept giving
their animals the best of care through the weekend. Even the rain
and mud didn’t stop them from looking after them.
Valuable lessons
That kind of responsibility is part of the learning process in
this project. Kids learn to faithfully provide for the animals in
their care, even when conditions make that hard.
Training animals for the show teaches them the value of
consistency and persistence, too. And the fact that the kids have
to look after another living creature teaches them that we, as
humans, are responsible for this world we live in. They learn to
be good stewards of the earth.
Kids learn to get along with each other, too. They pitch in and
help each other out, partly because they learn that getting beat
is part of growing up. Their time to win will come, even if it
isn’t in the show ring.
Livestock projects teach kids the kinds of things that will help
keep this world a nice place for their kids to live.
My hat’s off to all of these young people in the livestock
project. Well, except for that Wednesday night in that cold
barn.
(Mike Isbell is the Heard County Extension Coordinator with
the University of Georgia College of Agricultural and
Environmental Sciences.)
