Mary Loveland
Daily Elk Citian

4-H and FFA students from the county joined together for the next level of competition early this week.

The Beckham County Junior Livestock Show took place Monday and Tuesday in Sayre at the Activities Barn and showcased animals from Elk City, Merritt, Sayre and Erick. Hundreds of students have spent countless hours preparing for the event and for many of them, the county show serves as extra preparation for the biggest show of all, The Oklahoma Youth Expo (OYE) in Oklahoma City.

"I was really excited about how we exhibited our animals there at the Beckham County Show," Brandon Womack, Merritt High School FFA advisor, said. "I don't think we could have done any better than we did. It just shows how much effort they have put into these animals showing and preparing for these stock shows."

Merritt High School had some outstanding performers. Francis Potter, Merritt FFA vice president, showed three sheep that all received either grand reserve champion, champion or reserve champion status.

His natural colored wether received reserve grand champion and moved on to be sold in the premium auction sale.

Kayla Brown, Merritt FFA president, showed her barrow that received grand champion.

"We just have a lot of people in the Merritt community that know a lot about animals and we have a lot of people willing to spend some time and help out the kids," Potter, a junior, said.

Elk City's FFA chapter had equally impressive showings as they swept the heifer and market steer breeds. Conner Rogers raised two grand champions: one heifer and one market steer. Kenlee Crouch raised a reserve grand champion heifer and Josh McGuire raised a reserve grand champion market steer.

Senior Brooklyn Newton is in her second year of FFA and showed three pigs at the county show: duroc barrow, york barrow and commercial gilt.

One of her barrows made it to the premium auction.

"I did pretty well," Newton said. "I made $700. With the ad-ins I made almost $1000."

Only a selected few are chosen to participate in the premium auction after the completion of the stock show based on their performance. The auction gives those students an opportunity to make some of the money back that they spent buying and raising their animal.

"It's just a big donation," Elk City FFA member Ty Cloud said.

Cloud won breed champion for his simmental market steer and moved on to auction it off for $1800.

Erick FFA members also had their share of grand champion and reserve grand champion animals. Taylor Smith and Kasha McIntyre had grand champion does and goat wethers respectively. Alison Flowers and Tanner Smith had reserve grand champion does and goat wethers respectively.

Auctioneer Monte Tucker estimated that animals were auctioned for $750 on average through the ring and the sale brought in about $75,000 through the ring.

In just a little over a week, many of the county show participants will haul their animals to Oklahoma City for the OYE.

"There's a whole lot more people there and it's a whole lot harder to win because there's way more people in your class," Cloud said.

The OYE is one of the toughest and largest livestock shows in the nation.

"You have to be in the top of the class [to move to the sale]," Elk City FFA Advisor Larry Long said. "Most of the classes will have around 40 animals. Out of over 2,500 pigs they'll probably select about 45 or so."

Elk City will have about 30 students and Merritt will have about 25 traveling to the city show.

Last year, Brown won grand champion market lamb wether at the expo and Potter had a second place finisher in the class.

"I hope to go and win the natural colored breed lamb and hopefully I can go and get it all," Potter said.

The ultimate goal is to make it to the sale where students will have an opportunity to sell their animals for a 'good' price.

"If you don't get to go, you put them on a truck which takes them to the market," Potter said. "You don't even get hardly the fraction of the price that you can get at the sale. The OYE sale is one of the best sales in the country."

Students will continue to make their trips to the ag farm or to their own barn to get in one final week of walking, brushing and primping.

"Primarily, I want the students to take care of business at the show but also have fun while they're there," Long said.

The OYE will run from March 9-19.