She”””’’s back!  Pine-Shelter Cheyenne was exhibited by Molly Alberts Norling and Pine-Shelter Farms at the MN State Holstein Show in Owatonna, MN yesterday.  Not only did she compete and win the Aged Cow class, Cheyenne went on to be named Grand Champion, Best Udder and Best Bred & Owned of the show!  This makes Cheyenne a 3 time MN State Show Grand Champion – 2003, 2004 & 2006.  It was back in 2003 as a Sr. 3-Year-Old that she was Grand Champion of the International Holstein Show, All-American and the People”””’’s Choice winner.  She calved April 14th with a Durham son and is currently milking 140 lbs/day.  Judge Wikkerink complimented her tremendous balance and shared that he “wouldn””””t change much about her compared to the True Type model”.  Her length of neck and body, width of rump, great feet & legs, and bloom and width to her mammary system were all attributes Judge Wikkerink admired.  Cheyenne is a Pine-Shelter Laser Lindy daughter from an Emory dam and is currently scored EX-95.   

For Reserve Champion of the show, Judge Wikkerink selected the winning Jr. 3-Year-Old and Intermediate Champion, Macland Durham L Button.  Owned by Scott Culbertson, William McFarland and Wide-Open Holsteins, Button is a VG-88 Durham daughter of Macland Leduc Button-ET (VG-86).  Leduc Button is a full sister to Button A (VG-87) & Button B (VG-87), the 2nd & 3rd place Milking Sr. Yearlings at the 2005 World Dairy Expo.  Judge Wikkerink shared that Durham L Button was “on the mark today.  She”””’’s so clean, so dairy with a modern look and beautiful bone.  Her sound feet and legs and great mammary are exceptional.”           

It was the Junior Champion from the Junior Show on Wednesday that stole the heifer show again.  Poly-Kow Durham Caramel is owned by Meghan Connelly and Gracie Pierson.  As mentioned previously, Caramel’s dam is a VG-86 Leduc from Wilcoxview Rudolph Candace (EX-92).  Then 6 VG or EX dams back to Queen Roxy.  Caramel showed how competitive she can be by topping the heifer show.  “I really admire the beautiful quality about this heifer throughout.  Hard over her top with nice rib, so refined with good feet & legs,” Wikkerink said. 

Res. Junior Champion honors went to Miss Macland Sept Juliet-ET.  A September Storm Winter Yearling, Juliet”””’’s dam is Sco-Lo Integrity Juliet (EX-92).  Judge Wikkerink commented that she fit nicely with the Jr. Champion, exhibiting the same quality, refinement and balance that he likes to see in heifers. 

The Pierson Family of Sapa-Ska Farm in Lake City, MN was awarded the Premier Exhibitor award.  Some of their show highlights included 1st Winter Yearling, 1st Fall Yearling and 2nd Aged Cow.  The Demmer Family of Ellendale, MN was named the Premier Breeders of the show.  A couple of their highlights included 2nd Winter Yearling, 3rd Fall Calf, 2nd Futurity & 3rd Sr. 2-Year-Old. 

The show was hosted by the I-35 Holstein Club and was held at the Steele County Fairgrounds.  Over 240 head were exhibited on a beautiful day in MN.  A good crowd was also on hand to see MN”””’’s finest.  Congrats to all the exhibitors and show organizers on a great show! 

According to Dairy Profit Weekly (for the week of July 3rd), Canada is opening its border to a broader range of animals and products from the United States, which were suspended following the confirmation of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) in Washington State in 2003.  Effective immediately, all classes of US cattle, including those for breeding purposes born after 1999, are eligible for entry based on prescribed certification requirements.  Beef from cattle more than 30 months of age will also be eligible for importation under certain conditions.

There’’s no word on when the US border will be opened to breeding stock – including replacement heifers – from Canada.

What do you think?  Will this speed up the process to open the border both ways?  Is this a good move?

The water has receded and the show is ON!  This week’’s tremendous rain and flooding conditions paralyzed much of central and eastern New York, but as they say, the show must go on!  And indeed it will.  The Central New York Holstein Show will be held as scheduled at 9am, Wednesday, July 5th in Norwich, NY.  Cattle may begin moving in at noon on Sunday.  John Marshman reports that the flood waters did not get into the barns, so while conditions are a little soft, they are still in great shape.  The judge for the day will be Brian Carscadden, who will be asked to place over 200 entries.

We send our sincerest best wishes to those in Delaware and Chenango counties in New York, and through the rest of eastern PA, that recovery from the flood waters will be swift.  We”ve heard stories about tiestall barns with 5 feet of water running through them, corn fields with 10-foot swaths cut through the middle and all the corn washed away, as well as the Select Sires bull barn in Tunkhannock being without power – thank goodness for generators.  Further south, the Conowingo dam on the southern most end of the flooded Susquehanna River, has all but three gates open.  They”re trying to move water through there as fast as possible…if the last three gates have to be opened, the nearby town of Port Deposit, MD, will be completely under water.  To date, no one from the Holstein industry has been harmed, and we”re thankful of that!

Just want to wish everyone a happy and safe weekend and fourth of July.  We will near 100 degrees here in South Missouri for a few days but we’ve been pretty mild overall until now-so you’d expect that this time of year. Everybody be safe if you are traveling, and exercise care with those fireworks! 

Despite severe flooding throughout the northeast, cattle are finally in the new barn at Arethusa!  With some delays and major road closures/detours, the trucks arrived safely from a facility in PA, and both cattle and employees are settling in quite nicely to the new barn.  Watch for Open House details in the July Holstein World.

I just received a phone report from my mom that the MN Jr Holstein Show just got done.  Because we have our Open Show tomorrow, the Junior Show starts off with the cow classes and then has the heifer classes in the afternoon.   I thought Id do some quick background work on today”’’s champions and share it with you in my blog for the day.  Here it goes…

Grand, Sr. Champion & Best Udder was Cityview Spirit Roxie.  She was the winning 5-year-old and is sired by Hanover-Hill-R Spirit.  Currently scored EX-92, she is owned by Randi Staudinger and M.D. Polikowsky, both of SE MN.  Her dam is a VG-87 Broker, followed by a VG-86 Starbuck who are both in Canada.  The next 6 dams are all VG or EX.

Reserve Grand was the 1st 100,000 Lb. cow shown my Annie Culbertson of Pine Island, MN.  Macland E-Lance Star is also scored EX-92 and is sired by Valligrove Encore Lance, a 94 pt Encore x EX-90 Melvin.  Star”’’s dam is a VG-89 Melwood from a VG-86 Tesk.

Top of the heifer show was the 1st place Fall Sr. Yearling, Poly-Kow Durham Caramel.  She is owned by Meghan Connelly and Gracie Pierson.  Caramel”’’s dam is a VG-86 Leduc from Wilcoxview Rudolph Candace (EX-92).  Next dam is a VG-88 Mason, then a VG-88 Mark, EX-96 Tony Rae, EX-94 TT Roxette, EX-90 Roxette and then the Queen herself, EX-97 Roxy.  I saw this heifer a couple weeks ago and she is nice!  Im guessing she will be pretty competitive in tomorrow”’’s show.

Reserve Junior Champion honors went to Brooke Pollema of Browerville, MN.  Her 1st place Winter Calf was TJ-Pollema Advnt Sheena-Red.  Other than the fact that she is an Advent from an Arnell Elegant dam, I wasnt able to learn much more about this heifer.  But I hear she is a sweet red calf!

A competitive contest as always, this year”’’s showmanship winners were Lana Olson of Hutchinson, MN (Senior) and Katie Mohr of Glencoe, MN (Junior).  And yes, Lana is my sister!  Reserve Senior Showman is also a close friend of mine, recent DJM Finalist Casey Rickeman of Hutchinson, MN.  Reserve Junior Showman was Max Cloose of Solway, MN. 

Congratulations to all of this year”’’s winners!  At the end of the day Judge Roger Turner had placed 126 head.  Now Im packing up my things and heading north to make it in time for the Open Show tomorrow.  Look for results and pictures online in the near future!

SOS 

For those reading the daily convention newsletter, we found a Peach Kuchen recipe online and thought we””d publish it by popular demand. The dessert that tour goers enjoyed at Randy & Diane Schweer”’’s Watertown Holsteins, was by far, not the recipe that we shared in the newsletter.

Here is the official, real-deal, absolutely delicious recipe that you have been searching for!
Peaches ””n Cream Kuchen
Diane Schweer, Watertown, SD
Crust: 1 1/8 c. flour
1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
3/4 tsp. salt
1 lg. box cooked vanilla pudding
4 1/2 T. butter
2 eggs
3/4 c. milk

Filling: 2 8oz. pkg. cream cheese
2 15oz. cans sliced cling peaches or apricots, drained
1 c. sugar
8 T. reserved peach or apricot liquid

Topping: 1 1/2 T. sugar
3/4 tsp. cinnamon

Beat all crust ingredients for 2 minutes at medium speed with electric mixer. Pour into greased 9×13″ pan. Drain fruit (1 can apricots may be substituted) reserving liquid. Lay slices over crust leaving 1″ around sides of pan. Combine cream cheese, sugar & reserved liquid. Beat 2 minutes. Spoon over fruit & crust. Sprinkle topping mixture over filling. Bake 350 degrees for 35-40 minutes. Serves 15.

As the summer show season is now well underway, here’’s a question for you to ponder…

The All-American Contest used to feature a Produce of Dam class, which has since been eliminated.  The last All-American Produce was awarded in 2000.  Do you think the class should be added?  Do many state and regional shows currently have a Produce of Dam class so that a wide sampling of entries can be included in the contest?

Email your responses to me at sschmidt@dairybusiness.com.  We”d love to hear what people think about this topic!

In yesterday’s post I shared some of the competition results from this year’s National Junior Holstein Convention.  One event that I wasn’t quite ready to post the results from (because I was missing a couple placings) was the speaking contest.

A highly competitive contest that is full of talent, the speaking contest awards those Junior members that are both knowledgable in the Holstein and dairy industries while also being well versed and able to communicate our important message to others.  Congratulations to this year’s winners, we look forward to hearing more from you in the future!

Senior
1st Emily Miller – OR
2nd Jessica Berg – SD
3rd John Mitchell – IL

Intermediate
1st David Jones – CA
2nd Nancy Jackson – MO
3rd – Carolyn Braun – NY

Junior
1st Katelyn Mohr – MN
2nd Logan Moore – MD
3rd Sara Kitchen – PA