By Pete Kendall

reporter@trcle.com





One daily double in the Johnson County Junior Livestock Show is unusual enough. Briggs Hawkins, 10-year-old member of Friendship 4-H, supplied it with grand champion laurels in market goats and lambs.

A trifecta on top of the daily double is virtually unknown. Cleburne senior Kodie Carroll achieved that with grand champion trophies in market steers and pigs and the photography division of the Youth Fair.

Hawkins and Carroll got more than that, of course, during Saturday’s premium sale auction at Tom Frank Jones Arena on the Sheriff’s Posse grounds.

Carroll cashed the big check — $10,000 — from Mann Farm & Ranch and Community Bank for her steer and added $3,000 for the pig and $550 for the photo for a total of $13,550. Hawkins got $1,000 for the lamb and $2,250 for the goat for $3,250.

Also Saturday, Morgan Lyness of Friendship 4-H got $2,400 for a grand champion rabbit, Godley FFA’s Makenzy James $1,700 for a grand champion turkey, and Grandview FFA’s Mallorie Phelps $1,000 for a grand champion pen of three chickens.

Full results and sale numbers will be announced Tuesday.

It was arguably Johnson County Livestock Association’s most successful show ever.

“It’s been a tremendous show,” president Clint Ishmael said. “We had a record number of kids showing animals and a record number of animals. We had our biggest crowds, both for the show and the sale. We’re bursting at the seams. We’re going to have to do something about that. We had hogs stacked three and four deep in pens because we don’t have the room.”

He even got what he requested from the Weather Bureau — a cool, crisp Saturday morning and afternoon after unfriendly temperatures in the 80s the first two days of the show.

“We did ask for a little cooler weather after Wednesday and Thursday,” he said, laughing. “We were looking at highs in the 80s, and that’s awful hard on these animals and ids. It’s much better to be a little cool than a little hot.”

Pigs in particular suffered in cramped quarters during the weigh-in. That wasn’t strictly because of the heat. Pigs contain a stress gene that kicks into overdrive when the critter becomes uncomfortable.

“If a hog stresses out, there’s not much you can do about it,” Ishmael said. “Some will get so stressed you have to take them to the slaughterhouse. We didn’t lose any this week. We did have some that didn’t show because of the stress.”

A veteran of the show ring, Carroll stressed only once during the market steer competition. Her first animal threw her a sharp curve.

“I had a little mishap in the very beginning,” she said. “My show stick broke when I was showing my first steer. I was reaching back to move my steer’s foot. Right as I was reaching back, he stepped forward and stepped down on the stick. When I pulled, the tip of it came off. The tip is what I use to move his feet around.

“I was a little upset about that, but I got my boyfriend’s attention, and he brought me my extra stick. I still won my class with that steer. He was in the first class of the Europeans. My other (European) steer was in the third class. I didn’t have any upsets with him. He won his class. The second steer won breed champion. That meant I would go for the overall champion out of three steers.

“I wasn’t going to get my hopes up, because I didn’t want to get disappointed. I knew I had a good shot because mine was a really nice steer, but I wasn’t going to say I had it won yet. My goal was to come in here and win, and I did.”

Mr. Grand Champion Steer, all 1,320 pounds of him, is also Mr. Steer with No Name.

“I stopped naming them because I got too attached to them,” Carroll said. “They became pets. When they’re market animals, you can’t make them pets, because they’re going to end up in the food chain. I’m taking him to the Houston Livestock Show on March 10. If we don’t make the sale there, we’ll feed him out for another few weeks, and then he’ll go to the slaughterhouse.”

The grand champion pig was a surprise, Carroll said.

“I knew I had some pretty good pigs, but I didn’t know they were that good.”

Her hampshire and cross were breed champs. The 257-pound cross won the overall. The hamp won reserve. “Another girl’s pig was just a little better than my hamp,” Carroll said.

In her last year to show at county, she couldn’t have been more pleased. She was even able to win a grand championship with a portrait of a family member, a rooster that hangs at the house.

“That’s one of our family roosters,” Carroll said. “It was kind of an accident picture, but it turned out really well. I don’t know if I’ll tell him he won. He’s not so friendly.”

She won’t have to tell brother Bodie how well she fared. He was on the scene.

“I think he’ll be happy for me,” she said.

Hawkins enjoys both lambs and goats — he should, after this kind of success — but he prefers goats.

“Lambs are a little bit jumpier,” the Gerard Elementary student said.

Goats are allegedly easier to train for the show ring.

“We put them on a treadmill and walk them around,” Hawkins said. “Sometimes, we sit down and pet on them.”

He’s accustomed to doing well at county.

“I got first and second last year,” he said.

Brigg and 12-year-old brother Brayden will share this year’s winning.

“We’ll use it for like college and to buy some more lambs and goats,” Brigg said. “We get along sometimes.”



PREMIUM SALE AUCTION

Grand Champions

Steers — Kodie Carroll, Cleburne FFA, $10,000.

Pigs — Kodie Carroll, Ckeburne FFA, $3,000.

Lambs — Brigg Hawkins, Friendship 4-H, $1,000.

Goats — Brigg Hawkins, Friendship 4-H, $2,250.

Rabbits — Morgan Lyness, Friendship 4-H, $2,400.

Turkeys — Makenzy James, Godley FFA, $1,700.

Chickens — Mallorie Phelps, Grandview 4-H, $1,000.