Today, as I watched heifers and ewes being showed, I also watched the acrobatics of the IN ring photographers.\u00a0 Today’s\u00a0 livestock photography has evolved exponentially.\u00a0 From the days of old, when JPT livestock photography simply had a backdrop and used an umbrella and a kazoo to get an animal’s attention, to present times of the photographer sitting the camera on the ground to get that wicked perfect angle of a showman and their animal–unreal.\u00a0 Which brings up a question.\u00a0 Has a judge ever tripped over the photographer?<\/p>\n
No matter the species, you better start with a good one, then manage feed, environment, hair, hide and showmanship to the Nth degree and then have the final fit job dialed in to a T.\u00a0 Then make sure you get them in the right class.\u00a0 And sometimes that backfires.\u00a0 We managed to weigh out a good one.\u00a0 Oh well.\u00a0 Like Ritson Urban always said, “If you ain’t ever weighed one out, you weren’t trying to win very hard.”<\/p>\n
The OYE ag mechanics contest increased in #ers and in top end quality.\u00a0 Hats off to all that stepped up their game.\u00a0 It was impressive and will only get better.\u00a0 We had a good day with a division champ, 2 reserve division champs and all of our projects in the top 3.\u00a0 We came home with 4 new chop saws, 3 grinder sets, 2 John Deere air compressors and a Lincoln MIG welder.\u00a0 Not all bad.<\/p>\n
I like the double whammy factor of the Ag Mech contest.\u00a0 First, you have to build a quality project.\u00a0 Secondly, you have to be able to talk about your project.\u00a0 I had a pair that talked a division champion down into 3rd in their division.\u00a0 But, I also had a pair of senior girls that talked their pizza oven into a 3rd place in a really tough and large class.<\/p>\n
On a goat note, we survived the OYE doe show.\u00a0 There were some wicked wenches shown here.\u00a0 The showmanship and fit jobs were unparalleled.\u00a0 Although I didn’t always follow the judges placing, I truly felt like he picked does that he liked.\u00a0 There was no stench.\u00a0 If you wanted to place, then you better have a wide based, cool made one.\u00a0 And she better look the part and be shown right in order to win.\u00a0 I wish he handled them more but in the end, he found good goats.<\/p>\n
And on an OYE high note.\u00a0 The crew at OYE accidentally found a way to almost make this marathon enjoyable.\u00a0 As I easily found a parking spot on Friday morning, then walked into a CLEAN bathroom and noticed that the middle street was not a major traffic jam, it dawned on me while it was enjoyable.\u00a0 NO PIGS!!!\u00a0 \u00a0With the PED virus outbreak, the OYE gilt show is moved till after the market shows.\u00a0 This freed up a week with no pigs.\u00a0 The hotel hallways are not littered with wood chips.\u00a0 The elevators don’t smell like hog $h!t.\u00a0 The wait times at restaurants are shorter.\u00a0 It is simple math–you remove several thousand pigs and their owners, and everything gets easier.\u00a0 \u00a0Monday morning, property values will greatly decline as the barrows move in.\u00a0 They will put a strain on sewage, water, sanitation and the traffic.\u00a0 Sheer #ers cause issues.<\/p>\n
And for you morons that think that I am a hog hater.\u00a0 I have a hog showing AND breeding resume that is better than most hog jocks and not as good as some.\u00a0 I used to enjoy feeding and showing pigs.\u00a0 But, the current modern chemistry experiment that is required to feed & keep hogs sound in today’s current environment is not enjoyable.\u00a0 But thankfully, the other species seem to be headed down this same path.\u00a0 Nice!<\/p>\n
And when I get home from this marathon, Herfy the Hereford hog is waiting in the freezer.\u00a0 Can’t wait.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Today, as I watched heifers and ewes being showed, I also watched the acrobatics of the IN ring photographers.\u00a0 Today’s\u00a0 livestock photography has evolved exponentially.\u00a0 From the days of old, when JPT livestock photography simply had a backdrop and used an umbrella and a kazoo to get an animal’s attention, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/kellnlivestock.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4231"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/kellnlivestock.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/kellnlivestock.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kellnlivestock.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kellnlivestock.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4231"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/kellnlivestock.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4231\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4235,"href":"http:\/\/kellnlivestock.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4231\/revisions\/4235"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/kellnlivestock.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4231"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kellnlivestock.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4231"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kellnlivestock.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4231"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}