Field Day
For the past 71 years, the Butler Farm Show has been where Butler County 4-H members brought the farm and show animals they spent most of the previous year raising to be judged and hopefully sold.
This year's show, like countless other events, was canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
By the time the show usually starts in early August, some 4-H members have spent thousands of dollars to buy, feed and care for their animals.
They were looking forward to this year's Butler County Junior Livestock Sale at the show — and to recoup those investments — when the show was canceled in July.To help members sell the animals they raised, 4-H leaders set up a Butler youth livestock Facebook page and have reached out to buyers from previous farm shows.“They have either sold them through that Facebook page or we have contacted past buyers from over the years and they've bought them,” said Tammy Schultheis, a 4-H sale committee member and former 4-H'er.4-H is not allowing members to sell their animals as judged 4-H animals through the committee, she said. The Facebook sale allows them to sell the animals privately as 4-H projects.“It's a gray area we're trying to work out of,” Schultheis said.The National FFA Organization, which has a chapter at the Moniteau School District, follows 4-H rules for the junior livestock sale. FFA members also can sell their animals on the Facebook page, she said.Her 16-year-old nephew, David Schultheis, who has been active in 4-H for eight years, sold one of the two steers and one of the two lambs he raised for the show through the Facebook page.The steer sold through the page was a Shorthorn born on his family's registered Shorthorn cattle farm in Slippery Rock.“He weighed 1,125 pounds. He was born right here on our farm last year. He was about 17 months old,” David said.A family friend bought the other steer, which David bought from another farm in October when it was about 8 months old and 600 pounds.John Stilley, owner of Amerikohl Mining in Butler, bought the Shorthorn steer. The company bought six other steers from 4-H members and donated them to the St. Vincent DePaul Society, and purchased a 4-H charity hog that benefited the Pine Valley Camp in Ellwood City.David also sold two cross-breed Suffolk lambs, which he bought in the spring. One was sold to Rick Hangliter of Seven Fields through the Facebook page and a friend bought the other one. Both weighed about 150 pounds.
He said his sister, Makenzie, sold a 1,225-pound home-bred Shorthorn steer that she raised at the farm through the Facebook page to Keelan Dental of Butler.David said he is thankful to those who bought his animals.If his steers had won a championship at the show, they might have sold for a higher price, but he said he is grateful for the support of buyers during this unusual season.He estimated that $3,000 was spent on food, veterinarian bills and farm expenses for the Shorthorn steer he raised for 17 months.The cost of a young steer like the one bought can range from $500 to $2,000.Raising the lambs and hogs also was expensive.“It's a very expensive lifestyle, but it's what we like to do,” David said.Sonnet Robertson, 18, of Gibsonia is trying to sell 15 white New Zealand rabbits that she didn't get the opportunity to show.“I am right now kind of stuck with 15. It's getting a little chaotic here,” she said.New Zealand rabbits are known for gaining weight and maturing quickly and producing high-quality meat. Sonnet described the breed as the livestock of rabbits.She said a few people who saw her rabbits on Facebook inquired about them, but they remain for sale.“I'm kind of scared,” Sonnet said.The parents of the litter cost $60 each and she said she spent at least $300 feeding them since they were born June 5.Sonnet said she was counting on money from the sale to help cover the cost of textbooks for her freshman year at Slippery Rock University in the fall. She will attend classes online.“Those premium checks go a long way,” she said.
