Prince Edward County 4H Sheep Club Achievement Day, 2007

Here are some photos of the day! Here is Claire with Kivu, having some fun. Kivu, who is a "typical" Shetland and tends to be slightly nervous and spooky, was an old pro on Sunday. I think we tired her out :).

Here is Claire under the watchful eye of Judge Margaret Kerr. Marg is a Suffolk sheep breeder in the county, who also breeds cattle, registered Norwegian Fjord Ponies and working Border Collies. She is one busy lady.


Here is Claire setting up Kivu in the line:


Kivu took 1st place in the fleece class. The judge's reasons for putting Kivu first were 1. squareness and excellent conformation, 2. quality and consistency of fleece from front to back, and 3. conditioning. Marg's individual comments were that Kivu was in perfect condition, and that her coat was lustrous.

Small aside: A big thing in 4H is giving "reasons"; the 4H members are all expected to be able to develop their judging abilities themselves, and to be able to intelligently give their top three reasons for the placement of each animal in the group. For the meat market and fleece classes, EACH competitor had to also judge the class with a prize going to the member who came closest to the judge's placement. It can be very difficult with a large group! Marg was great, and even allowed onlookers to judge and give reasons.

Alison's classes with Jasmine were even larger. Here is a closeup of her in her class:


And here is a shot of the whole class. Alison's lamb was the only lamb of woolly parentage; the rest of the lambs were Katahdin, with one Katahdin/Dorper cross. Since they are a dedicated meat breed we didn't think she'd do very well. Marg placed Jasmine 1st in the meat market class, later calling Jazzy the "finest ewe lamb she'd seen in quite a while". Her reasons were 1. squareness and length of carcass, 2. length and musculature of leg (think leg of lamb here) and 3. conditioning.

This photo shows half of the class only.

In addition to taking first place in the lamb classes, both girls took second place in their respective showmanship classes (Alison in Senior, Claire in Junior). We were incredibly proud of them; they have put in a lot of time with their lambs and it really showed.

After the show, our host farm did a big barbeque and we connected with others in the industry. We were thrilled that Linda Swaine, our mentor, was able to attend, but we were sorry that Bill Stearman (our generous Shetland shepherd) was not with us. Next year, the show will be a more traditional 4H event where the lambs will get auctioned off. Eek. Not sure how that will fly with the girls :).