4-H & Junior Sheep show is all business at the front all party at the back at the Logan County Fair

[August 04, 2024]   Thursday morning came early for the young people who participated in the 4-H and Junior Sheep Show at the Logan County Fair. Starting at 8 a.m. the day long event is like a good mullet, business at the front and all party in the back. The business of course was the judging of the animals by breed and sex with the end result being a grand champion Wether (male) and a grand champion Ewe (female). Additionally there were classes for wool producing animals and for Market or meat animals.

At the end of the “business” part of the day was the Scramble Sheep judging. Those who attend the Logan County Fair scrambles night may be seeing a red flag here. At the Wednesday night scramble there are chickens, pigs, goats, and calves, but there are NO sheep. So how does the sheep show include a scramble event?

Jim, John and Jared Coers are the superintendents of the show. Also the owners of 3-J Farms, the Coers have a keen interest in seeing sheep production grow in Logan County, starting with kids participating in raising lambs. To help encourage kids to participate in raising sheep, the Coers devised their own scramble program, where kids file applications for the lambs.

John Coers explained that the program started with giving three sheep and has expanded to five, but will have to stop there. He said the kids file their applications and are selected to raise following the guidelines of the other shows of maintaining good records, learning showmanship, and of course raising a healthy lamb.

He said when fair time rolls around, the records are judged pre-fair by Lincoln Community High School Ag Teacher and FFA sponsor Molly Schempp who is also a Logan County 4-H alumnus with experience with sheep.

The Thursday morning judging then included showmanship and the judging of the animal itself.

John Coers also pointed out that the winner of the Scramble will receive a traveling trophy that was hand made by Jared Coers.

When the judging took place the youngsters paraded their animals in front of the judge and worked hard to demonstrate the rules of good showmanship.

In the class the five participants were Race Sherren, Preslee Sherren, Harper Bell, Remington Houser, and Raylon Schreiner.

This year’s winner was Raylon Schreiner.

The Grand Champion Wether was Rophan Allspach

The Reserve Champion Wether was Raylon Schreiner

The Grand Champion Ewe was Jayce Coers

The Reserve Champion Ewe was Shelby Heyen

The Grand Champion Ewe Lamb was Raylon Schreiner

When the scramble sheep judging was completed, the day took a turn from business to party starting with the annual Sheep Show picnic, which obviously featured lamb as the primary protein.

After lunch, the first event on the docket was the PeeWee Showmanship event. This is an an event where that the littlest of littles get to show off what they know about showing sheep. For some it is strictly business, while for others it is a lot of fun and a chance to pour some lovin’ on a fuzzy sheep.

[Nila Smith]