March 2010 Articles

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Just Rambling

Just Rambling: About the Front Cover - Pictured on our front cover this month is our youngest daughter, Blair with her Charolais show heifer - RHF Delilah #58. Blair has had a very good show year with this heifer having won both Reserve Champion Charolais heifer and Reserve Champion Louisiana Bred Charolais heifer at the State Fair of Louisiana Livestock Show in Shreveport this past October. Along with her Reserve Championships, she and her heifer were selected to attend the North American International Livestock Exposition in Louisville, Kentucky for five days in November of 2009. This was a wonderful trip for Blair. She traveled with and met many other 4-H/FFA Livestock exhibitors throughout the state and was a part of what is advertised to be the largest Livestock Exposition in the world. Not only was this a great trip for Blair but it was a great trip for Donnette and myself as we traveled to Louisville to watch Blair and the rest of the Louisiana delegation compete. Blair’s success with Delilah continued this year with her winning both Grand Champion Charolais Heifer and Grand Champion Louisiana Bred Charolais Heifer at the Northeast Louisiana District Livestock Show in Delhi then traveling to the LSU State Livestock Show held at the Lamar Dixon Expo Center in Gonzales where she won Grand Champion Charolais Heifer and Grand Champion Louisiana Bred Charolais Heifer there, as well. As the old hunters saying goes, “it is always exciting to have a puppy in the race but especially exciting and thrilling when the puppy leads the pack.” This is the feeling I had with Blair and Delilah this past show year but the most gratifying feeling was knowing that this heifer was home raised. Delilah was the calf of a previous home raised show heifer of Blair’s and was sired by Dana’s (our 18 yr old daughter) show bull (pictured below) that was purchased in 2004 as a calf from Mr. Wendell Sewell of El Dorado, Arkansas. That July day in 2004 Dana, Blair & I rode with Mr. Sewell through his pastures before his calves were weaned to pick out a show bull for each girl. As soon as we got in the pasture Dana picked out her bull calf & before getting through all the pastures, Mr. Sewell told Dana she had picked out the best calf. Dana named her bull Austin ( not his registered name) & she had a great show career with him & he has sired many good calves on our farm. One of Austin’s best traits was his great disposition. At every livestock show, Austin’s disposition was such that Dana could even let school children rub him. He was a sap for attention & loved to be pampered, especially by Dana. She has since shown two of his sons & did well with them but neither quite matched up to Austin in Dana’s eyes. The conclusion to this story, as Dana tells it, is that Blair & Delilah won the championship but without Austin this would not have been possible.