Brooklyn and Mollie Meyers pose with their lamb at Thursday’s Bred and Fed show at the Putnam County Fair.
Jacob Espinosa | The Lima News
OTTAWA — Brandi Shrader said children participating in the Bred and Fed animal shows at the Putnam County Fair put in hours of prep work to get their projects ready to be judged.
For Fort Jennings-area sisters Mollie and Brooklyn Meyers, both 14, the hard work paid off as Molly’s lamb, which Brooklyn bred, was named champion reserved market lamb in the third show of the day.
“A lot of the prep work is done at home, and they spend numerous hours with these livestock daily,” Shrader, a committee member for the shows, said. “When they get to the show, it doesn’t stop. They’re still working with their lambs daily and shearing their wool off, and they’re rinsing them and you will see them bracing their lambs in the show ring.”
Judges such as Luke Wechter will look at the animal’s muscularity and structure as it walks around the ring, but what really impressed him was seeing kids raising multiple species.
“That’s really cool and coming from a background of showing multiple species and raising them, I can say there is nothing more exciting and rewarding than having success with something you raise,” he said. “The neat aspect about today is these kids have worked with their projects, and it wasn’t just a summer project for them. The breeding plans took a year in advance, and everything went into raising them and feeding them, so it’s fun working with all the kids and these projects they fed throughout the summer.”
Goat breeder Megan Wentz sat ringside to observe animals she sold to junior farmers and said she found it fun to watch the showings.
“I think it’s what 4-H is all about,” she said. “It’s about learning responsibility, taking care of your animal, putting in the work and seeing the results.”
Shrader said she hopes people see how responsible the farmers are.
“The knowledge that they gain and the friends that they make because of this program are so important,” she said. “It’s a neat program, and it’s a neat thing to watch your kids grow up in this program. The maturity and responsibility is second to none.”
Wechter said the best kids are being raised through the program today.
“4-H is building the future, and there’s a lot going on in today’s world,” he said. “They learn big-time life skills that benefit the end goal of getting into a career. These kids have a big advantage because they’ve worked hard and they’ve gone through a competitive atmosphere, but they’ve learned a lot of responsibilities and things that are going to do a lot for them.”
All 4-H members who meet eligibility requirements at the Putnam County Fair can exhibit at the Ohio State Fair in July.
Reach Jacob Espinosa at 567-242-0399.
