By JAN LARSON McLAUGHLIN
BG Independent News
Teens accustomed to maneuvering massive livestock agonized about managing a little white rabbit. And some who had mastered showing poultry were handed the reins to obstinate goats.
In the end, the competitor with the greatest skills at handling eight species won the Showmanship Sweepstakes at the Wood County Fair on Sunday.
Owen Brinker, from the Eastwood area, was declared champion. He had already won top awards for showing sheep, earning him the right to compete in the Showmanship Sweepstakes.
Named reserve champions were Collin Britton, who was top in the beef category, and Noah Lang, top in the goat category. Lang and Britton are sharing the honors of reserve champion of the Showmanship Sweepstakes due to a scoring error announced after the show.
Others competing and their areas of expertise were Taylor Hannan, swine; Jack Reichart, rabbits; Katie Clark, horses; Madison Weichman, poultry; and Nick Cline, dairy.
The showmanship sweepstakes requires the champions in each species to show the other seven species before judges – not to mention a huge crowd of families, friends and fairgoers. They got to sit out when their species was shown.
That meant a lot of crash courses during the week for the horse champion to learn about handling chickens, and the goat champion to learn about swine.
The competition started in the horse arena, with each teen being given the reins to a horse and instructed on a course they must follow. They walked the horses through cones, jogged with them, and urged them to walk backwards.
Cline relied on his expertise with dairy cows. “I knew how to grab the lead strap,” he said. It was the next stop that he was worried about – the rabbits.
“When you flip them over, they tend to not like that at all,” Cline said. “I’m nervous about that.”
Hannan, who has experience showing goats, sheep, steer, horses and swine, was dreading holding the chicken and answering the judge’s questions.
“I’m petrified of birds,” Hannan said. She knew she needed a crash course in poultry before Sunday. “I held a chicken for the first time last night, and I almost cried.”
Next came the bigger livestock species, with beef feeders lumbering into the show ring.
Britton, the champion in the beef feeder category, watched as his competitors tried to make the cattle behave.
“I got pushed around a bit by my calf in the ring,” Brinker said.
Britton’s advice had been simple – relax.
“Chill out. The more relaxed you are, the more relaxed they are,” said Britton, who sported a mullet and laid back style. “Just let the boat float.”
The feeder calves being shown were born this past spring, and weigh in around 500 pounds. But not for long, Britton explained.
“I have a fat steer sitting over in the stall, weighing 1,475 pounds.”
Britton’s one area of concern was also poultry. “I’m not a big bird guy. They are weird to me,” he said.
Lang stood by as his fellow competitors tried to manage the goats.
“My goat wouldn’t walk,” Weichman said.
“Some of them are ornery,” Lang said, watching the goats put their brakes on and refuse to walk. Some buckled their front legs and collapsed, refusing to budge.
“That brown goat won’t even walk, he had to be carried in,” Lang said of one especially obstinate goat.
Lang’s secret to success with goats is daily training.
“I work with them twice a day, morning and night, about an hour each,” he said.
Next was the dairy cow category, allowing Cline to sit out that round. Some of the competitors got small calves, while others got full-grown dairy cows. But sometimes bigger is better.
“Little ones tend to be more energetic,” Cline said. “The older ones are more broken in.”
Showing a full-grown cow was Hannan.
“I had the big one – and had to walk it backwards,” she said.
The sheep proved to be a big challenge. They were the noisiest, and difficult to manage since there were no leads. The competitors had to maneuver the sheep by holding their heads.
“My sheep got ornery for me,” Reichart said.
The no collar rule held for swine as well – which weighed around 270 pounds each. The swine were directed around the ring with pretty constant tapping on their neck areas with sticks.
“Your first 10 steps are going to make the big difference” when showing swine, Hannan said. The key with swine is keeping them moving, tapping on the belly to get moving, on the right side to go left, on the left side to go right.
Brinker attributed his success to his broad experience showing goats, sheep, swine and cattle. So he had half of the species mastered before the competition.
“I started off with a good background,” Brinker said.
Brinker is a member of Livestock Unlimited, Britton is a member of Leaders of Tomorrow, and Lang is a member of Simply Stock. They are all Junior Fair members.
