My Kids' 4-H Calves

[Keren]

Daisy
I understand where your comming from. Can your mom or dad walk the animal around for you? If dad can help, that would be great. He is a lot stronger than you and can keep the steer from pulling down and getting away. Once the animal knows they can get away from you they will try to do this to you a lot. If a steer pulls away from my daughter......thats when I take the steer and give it a cumming to Jesus meeting. Ill fermly tell him no, walk him around the pen, give him back to my daughter and then she will tie his head high on the pipe fence for about 30 min. It's kinda like training your dog, they do somthing bad you tell them no and with a steer you take it one step further....tie them up.
I also bought a hot walker which we now call a steer walker and we walk them one mile twice daily on it. This way my daughter can work the steers with their heads held high and keeps them from getting heavy headed. There is nothing worse than trying to hold their head up in the ring for ten to fifteen min. If her steer acts up no matter what he does they can't get away from her. This also works great with setting them up and takes a big heavy load (the steers head) off of you while training them to keep their head up. This is also the time you can work with your animal with the show stick.
If the steer wont walk forward, mom or dad will be stronger than you and can make them walk. When your walking the steer it is a good idea to have someone behind the steer and when he wont walk they can help you. This is also why we use the rope chain halters, all my kids have to do now is snap the chain a few times and the steer changes his mind and starts to walk.
I hope this has been helpful This is what we do, maybe you can use some of this advice.

10 to 15 mins?

When I was heavily showing steers our classes would take between half and three quarters of an hour. I certainly dont miss that part of it. Most of the time I couldnt feel my arm when I came out of the ring.

 

[show steer up]

Ya I remember those days too, seemed like we were in the ring forever.
Around here they break up the classes to no more than ten in the ring at a time. Our show ring is small, so the classes are over fast. The kids hit the ring at 9 a.m. and the show will be over by 1. The longest class will be showmanship. The kids will be in the ring around 30 min. at the most.
They don't know how lucky they are
All in all our fair will have 98 steers this year, and only 25 can sell. If the kids get lucky they get the extra 2 min. in the auction ring

 

[show steer up]

My mother had back surgury three years ago and had metal in her spine, one wrong fall can be disatrous. And my father would love to help but he has a bad neck, he has a buldging disk and one wrong move on him can paralze him for the rest of his life.

Sorry to hear about your parent's fragile condition, wish I could be there to help you.

Plus when others break your steer for you, that steer loses that respect for you and gives it to another.

Don't be affraid to let people help you with your animals. The more they are around other people the better it is in the long run.
Good luck, hope everything works out

 

[Keren]

Ya I remember thoese days too, seemed like we were in the ring forever.
Around here they break up the classes to no more than ten in the ring at a time. Our show ring is small, so the classes are over fast. The kids hit the ring at 9 a.m. and the show will be over by 1. The longest class will be showmanship. The kids will be in the ring around 30 min. at the most.
They don't know how lucky they are
All in all our fair will have 98 steers this year, and only 25 can sell. If the kids get lucky they get the extra 2 min. in the auction ring

Wow, the steer classes at our royals can have 40 - 60 head in them!

I

 

[show steer up]

Ya I remember thoese days too, seemed like we were in the ring forever.
Around here they break up the classes to no more than ten in the ring at a time. Our show ring is small, so the classes are over fast. The kids hit the ring at 9 a.m. and the show will be over by 1. The longest class will be showmanship. The kids will be in the ring around 30 min. at the most.
They don't know how lucky they are
All in all our fair will have 98 steers this year, and only 25 can sell. If the kids get lucky they get the extra 2 min. in the auction ring

Wow, the steer classes at our royals can have 40 - 60 head in them!

I

If you think that's amazing, get this Karen.... our kids don't know how lucky they are Not only is the numbers down on entrys but they get premium prices for sale. If you get into auction every kid will get at least 10k for their steers, around 4k for a lamb, and 6k for a pig:clap: Very seldome will they get less.
Two years ago the bottom sale steer got 12k. We had a lot of mad people here when our auction took a dive last year, because of bad press. The bottom animal got 6k and many familys went away crying. Most of the steers at this fair cost the exibitor 8k to 23k to get to fair (stupid people.)So people did lose money, and I wasnt the least bit sorry for them. :banana:
It's great we get the big bucks out here, but don't go and blow it on an expensive animal. I don't think any trophy is worth that. But people out here do, soooooooo the compitition is very very strong.
I on the other hand am extremly greatful, anything over our cost is a blessing. I think last year our family and about three other kids were the only ones that made money last year anywhere else the kids would be jumping for joy...........but not here, oh no.........we have to many spoild brats.


Because our fair is trying to keep our auction prices high, the kids can only have two animals in the auction. If they show steers and pigs, etc. only two of them can sell. this does have its draw back, its hard for a new person to get started out here. You deffinetly have to have a coat if your going to have any chance at sale. At this fair, no coat no sale and I don't care how good your animal is. So the new person who cant afford a cooler barn is out of luck. You cant do that for too many years

Our fair also sells a cake in the auction. The grand champion cake will always pull in 6-12k.

 

[show steer up]

What the heck is a cloverbud? I don't remember ever having heard that around here in regards to 4h.

around here a cloverbud is a 4-H child under the age of 9.

 

[randiliana]

Ya I remember thoese days too, seemed like we were in the ring forever.
Around here they break up the classes to no more than ten in the ring at a time. Our show ring is small, so the classes are over fast. The kids hit the ring at 9 a.m. and the show will be over by 1. The longest class will be showmanship. The kids will be in the ring around 30 min. at the most.
They don't know how lucky they are
All in all our fair will have 98 steers this year, and only 25 can sell. If the kids get lucky they get the extra 2 min. in the auction ring

Wow, the steer classes at our royals can have 40 - 60 head in them!

I

If you think that's amazing, get this Karen.... our kids don't know how lucky they are Not only is the numbers down on entrys but they get premium prices for sale. If you get into auction every kid will get at least 10k for their steers, around 4k for a lamb, and 6k for a pig:clap: Very seldome will they get less.
Two years ago the bottom sale steer got 12k. We had a lot of mad people here when our auction took a dive last year, because of bad press. The bottom animal got 6k and many familys went away crying. Most of the steers at this fair cost the exibitor 8k to 23k to get to fair (stupid people.)So people did lose money, and I wasnt the least bit sorry for them. :banana:
It's great we get the big bucks out here, but don't go and blow it on an expensive animal. I don't think any trophy is worth that. But people out here do, soooooooo the compitition is very very strong.
I on the other hand am extremly greatful, anything over our cost is a blessing. I think last year our family and about three other kids were the only ones that made money last year anywhere else the kids would be jumping for joy...........but not here, oh no.........we have to many spoild brats.


Because our fair is trying to keep our auction prices high, the kids can only have two animals in the auction. If they show steers and pigs, etc. only two of them can sell. this does have its draw back, its hard for a new person to get started out here. You deffinetly have to have a coat if your going to have any chance at sale. At this fair, no coat no sale and I don't care how good your animal is. So the new person who cant afford a cooler barn is out of luck. You cant do that for too many years

Our fair also sells a cake in the auction. The grand champion cake will always pull in 6-12k.

In our local club there is a total of 20 steers (or so) and they are divided by weight. So none of the classes are really huge.At the achievement day, they show in a breed class, a weight class and of course showmanship. Our show will start at 12 and be over about 3 in the afternoon. After the Club Achievement Day, we go to the Regional Show and Sale. There the steers are only shown in Breed (of sire) classes, and in Showmanship. Then all the steers will sell. Not sure exactly how many, but probably around 60 steers will show. The kids get paid on the weight of their steer x market price (at minimum) up to around $2/lb. So no really huge prices here. Most steers come out of Mom and Dad's herd, so no-one is buying high priced calves to show here either. Some may buy a steer from a local rancher or at the local auction mart. The only steers that won't sell are the ones that weren't brought to the Regional show (which would be the ones that could be dangerous, or that died)

 

[randiliana]

around here a cloverbud is a 4-H child under the age of 9.

Yep, it is the same thing here. We have Cloverbuds, Junior, Novice and Senior.

 

[show steer up]

Most steers come out of Mom and Dad's herd, so no-one is buying high priced calves to show here either. Some may buy a steer from a local rancher or at the local auction mart.

You know, this is what should happen.

The talk around here is , the prices at this years auction will be lower than last year. But it didn't keep the people from spending outragious amounts of money on the steers. In another post I talked about a local steer with kidney stones, well That family spent 12k on him :shock: they have six steers going to the fair and the mom's comment was........"at least he was our least exspensive steer, if we had to loose one I'm glad it was him." Then she was crying about the price it cost to run her cooler barn (one thousand + a month) :shock: all I could do was stand there with my jaw dropped open. She then went on complaining that her daughters grand champion steer only sold for eight thousand..........She said," the animal cost us more than that." I was in shock, all the while her thirteen year old daughter was nodding her head in agreement with her mom.
The family won grand champion steer and there mad :shock: :shock: :shock: :shock:

I must say..........I will never be disapointed about the big checks, it keeps the kids going on their projects and is building a great college fund for them. But it is real hard to feel sorry for these people for loosing their butts. I just don't get it............I don't care how much money you can spend on an animal, if you can't show a profit at the end of the road, what joy is there in winning :???:
:clap: :clap: Yea........we won :clap: :clap: and we only went in the hole twelve thousand :clap:
What moron's