 We're going to give you kind of an overall objective of what we're kind of doing with this series. So we're, this is kind of for all the series and just like Becky asked that is recorded and it's an eight part series. So if you missed the beef one from last Monday, we can certainly have you go back and watch that because everything's recorded and it's a perfect opportunity for us to embrace this new virtual learning reality of being in this Covoid season. So all these sessions are going to touch on training and grooving or talk about a showmanship species video that North Dakota has shot and presented. We'll cover some showmanship movement and positions. And then we'll talk about you as an exhibitor and just some of the different things that you can be as a mentor and showing your leadership. So Dr. Hoffman, why don't you take it away? Okay, thank you very much, Dr. Skirpe. So I get the opportunity to talk to you about sheep showmanship and I've drawn this together to a little bit of the background of some of the things that we want to accomplish. So this is the format that I'll follow, particularly specific to this video. So we're going to first talk about personal conduct, touch a little bit on terms of nutrition, equipment, preparation of those lambs, and then grooming and fitting. And then of course, we'll try to focus as much as we possibly can on the grooming and fitting as well. Also then, but the true focus then will be our skills in the ring, how we can be able to correctly provide a high quality showing opportunity for our youth in 4-H and FFA. And then we will augment that with a showmanship video that our colleagues at through North Dakota State University Extension put together to show us just a little bit of descriptions on how animals are moving and describe that. And then hopefully have some dialogue for you as well. So on terms of our personal conduct, we have a 4-H dress code as part of North Dakota. And with that, individuals are to wear a white, green or gray or yellow, shirt and blouse and it should have a 4-H emblem on that. And then also we would want to make sure just in terms of those generalities that we have a basic understanding of our project and know what we are feeding that, what information we are providing for the background. Because not only is the exhibition of our animals just the culmination, hopefully of our shows, but it may be the culmination of a period of time from when those were purchased, it was from the spring to show them in the fall for at least a majority of the northern and midwestern states, obviously on different timelines in different regions across America. Or you may be one that has raised either your market animals or your breeding animals. So a couple things here as we discuss that and then kind of shift into a focus here as we move on is that remember that you are a mentor to others and you're an ambassador to our industry. And so knowing that you are within a show ring just allows us the chance to be out there and to exhibit our animals and the hard work and the efforts that you've put in throughout the summer. From a simplistic standpoint, but truthfully just courtesy, avoid the bumping and crowding and we have no need, nor ever should we expect hitting of animals. And hopefully you can work with your animal on so that there had been some work prior to and if it was to spook it for any particular reason that we have an opportunity to stay calm and be out there. Remember to congratulate those winners, learn from your mistakes and that each of us are winners. I think we can understand relative to showmanship that may be different is that if we were showing our animals, obviously we tried to do the best that we can in terms of exhibiting those. But some of us maybe that showmanship is the true super goal because each person gets to walk out with a given chance to know that they can be competitive and they can be rewarded for their efforts. One of the things quickly here is the nutrition portion. And so we don't want to go into this too much. And in fact, it's best to, again, have a little bit of an understanding of what you're trying to accomplish with feeding your lamb. You're going to want to get those lambs growing, truthfully, as soon as when they are on the lamb to provide either some soybean meal, high protein, sweet feed and concentrates for those animals. Complete feed provides you a better opportunity so that they don't sort through those because animals will grab the whole corns or the whole kernels and sometimes forget the fines. As we are growing those animals, we'll have a higher protein of 18 to 20 percent for younger lambs. Then as we slow those lambs down or are getting closer to our ideal market weight, we can decrease the amount of protein that is in those feeds to approximately 14 to 16 percent in terms of the proteins. And that allows us, again, to understand here a couple of things as we move to our third bullet point is what is our target weight? If we have a smaller framed animal, that smaller framed animal may be in the lower 100s at 110, 115, 120. One can presume that the average there, at least for some markets, weights would be approximately 130 to 145. But there's plenty of lambs that can go above that. Our industry does accept some that are above that as well. But if we can stay in a range and have an understanding that fits, I aim for normally about two-tenths to three-tenths of back fat, preferably under three-tenths, certainly. But if you have an idea of where we can try to be in terms of finish weight and ideal fat covered, that allows us to competition to be as best as we can, relative to market acceptability. There are various supplements available in particular, and I didn't need to just pick out two of these. But we have a feed analysis of two different feeds. And in fact, work with the ones that fit best for you. I'm not particularly advocating for any. And you can decide if there's supplements that may work. I'm well aware that many people can accomplish what they want to do in the show ring, truthfully by using corn and oats to concentrate and working hard in terms of that standpoint. There's also some feed additives that can help for different reasons. It may work for you. You have to identify that. The last thing on this is provide your lamb with clean and fresh water. To me, some of our challenges come on our water and our challenges with our industry as well. And in case some places will not allow drenching of lambs. So some people so choose to use a complete feed that's liquid and can't literally advocate that. And you have to identify what works best for your operations. But then we can be able to, if you so choose to limit water, maybe make sure that it's only a little bit night before or morning of and make sure that that's not a problem from an animal welfare standpoint for us to move forward. Very quick, and we have our sheep halter. Most of the time we will start with a nylon halter that we can have available. We also have a curry comb that is in the top left. It can be used to allow us to get some of the larger pieces of straw or sawdust out, a wool card that we could particularly use. Used to could fully just be used more so in the breeding sheep. Of course, now in our game where everything has a little bit more wool from the knee and hot down, we've got a wool card that we can be able to use. The hand sheep shears there is in the middle. And I so choose the leather bound ones in terms of my game there of using them. It's certainly worth a little extra efforts and a little extra prices there so that your hands aren't nearly as painful by the end of the summer. We put two different options there for electric clippers and then the one on the farther right in the top right corner would be more for a rough touch of an animal. Shape out a breeding sheep and provide improvements in terms of decreasing them on a wool that may be on the sides and the front end and leveling out the top shape. And then a lot of people will also use more of a portable or even a two speed flipper there in the maroon color to be able to find up some of those places, particularly in terms of the head and leg wool that we do have that has become ever so popular. So we also want some wool and clipper lube if we can or will or clipper lube. A trimming stand would certainly be appreciated. We have opportunities to use a tube and or a blanket. And what this is primarily doing is allowing us to keep those animals a little cleaner because we have our hose and our soap and our blower that we can be able to wash them, provide them as bright and as white as we can and provide that skin condition that ideally we would like and be able to use that for our keeping them a little bit cleaner. As we said, but those can also be used in breeding sheep as well. Meat breed, breeding sheeps we will wash, will breed, we will not. And in fact, a bigger difference on that. And then, of course, taking the clipping of those animals as we move through it. We have our also our hoof trimmer that made it on the far right corner. And I've discussed with many people that often old school times they had two metal fulcrums or two metal levers that would come together and clip the hooves. And that was absolutely the wrong idea. And a young lady that was by the age of approximately 85 years old told me, why don't we use these tree pruners? And I thought it was a different deal. But of course, you can now find these in your livestock operations and being able to trim hooves with these tree pruners. Initially, what they were, but we can mark them as sheep of what trimmers and we'll maybe even put an extra markup on it and call it the answer. So I put this in here in terms of just preparation. And can I throw a lot of papers up and I move through this and that's the way I think we can be able to provide just a little bit more information and allow us to flex the ability so that we can answer a fair amount of questions here at the end. This is actually a fun picture. This is my grandfather at the halter and my dad parting legs on a cordial sheet that was the breed of choice as I grew up. But halter breaking first. And we'll talk about that a little bit, keeping the head up, setting the legs square. We'll talk about the positioning in the ring, grooming and fitting as we move forward, cleanliness. And most often there that the hard work is appreciated by the judge because to be able to identify those that have worked a little bit harder with their operations. Dr. Hoffman, I have a quick question just to interrupt. Do you have a individual that has a hair sheath? Is there anything that you would recommend for the hair sheath? I think that I would say in terms of the hair sheath is to keep them clean as well. It depends on what kind that you have. Cotton's oftentimes would leave some of the hair on them because they do have a more coat of hair. If you have a doerper, it is more commonly accepted since that's hair and wool to shear those animals off. And so if they were breeding stock, you can be able to leave it as just the hair that's on them. If it was a market animal, I would clip them down similar to what we would with a tiner so that we can be able to see that muffle shape on a market animal if you so choose a hair sheath breed. So this is actually a picture that you, Lam, that's at side was one of them from North Dakota State University. She went on actually to win her class at the National Columbia Sheep Show and Sale. And I say that partly because the more and more on the fact that lambs are being sold at this point early in the year of whether that's plenty of sales have happened and starting in February, March, now April, but you can be able to identify them. And I hope that you can look for skeletal and muscle, muscle confirmation. So we know that that you, Lam, is very long bodied. We know that she's very correct in terms of her feet and leg structure, even before that tail has has fallen off at this point. In terms of muscle, you can be able to identify the amount of muscle shape that they have as you evaluate it from the top side of their shoulder, back to their wrap, to the loin and through the rear leg as well. And so the other thing that I look at in terms of young animals to look at the rib cage, the roundness that we have in the rib cage and also the base width. And so you can look in terms of the feet and leg structure as you look at the front legs and as you look at the rear legs as they travel and you evaluate them from behind to see true muscle shape and dimension. And it's your job to work in terms of nutrition, average daily gain and feed and fat composition to make sure that those don't say to trim or more commonly to fat for our production and for our shows. Train your lamb to tie and to lead with a halter. It doesn't have to be a nylon halter, but and then you can transition to working with them without the halter prior to show for young people. And again, Leanne showed that we have a very young audience for us here today is that those young people feel free, if you need experience, you know what? Take that animal out there and and have that halter on it. And that's OK. It is for me because most importantly, I want you to have confidence out there and you can use it as a backup if you just have it in your hand and are able to use just the hand and the and and holding its head as well. You have something that provides a little bit more confidence. That'll be OK. So when you come out under me the next time I'll say I'll challenge you the next time without it. So just feel free to work through that as you get better with your career and with your fees. Of course, you can also lead your lamb as part of your exercise program and then train them to respond to your actions, working with them and trying to be able to improve them the best you can. But preparing your animal. And again, I didn't put a to-do list of 12 different points. And if you have any questions, I'm sure we'll share my contact information if you wish to work with me or talk about more specific things. But we have some differences here. And the young lady I'll start in the middle there with the pink and we'll show a couple of hers. This is actually a weather dam. OK, and so or it could have been a market lamb, but certainly I want on a larger end. But you wash those, you transition and leave a little bit from that knee and hock down that you can work with and be able to shape however you so wish. We have a Montadeo on the top right. That one's clean. We can see that they wash that one and kept it clean. There's just a little bit of stains in the rear area. But for the most part, they did a great job of keeping that clean. Use the blanket and was able to fit that and make it really smooth. The bottom right one was actually born and bred here in North Dakota. That was a Supreme Champion U at Sedalia. And so you can see a little bit of color variation on that one's body. And so what happened is that when you have a wool breed sheep, is that there is a little bit of dirt. You can trim a little bit of that dirt off. Or if you take more wool off, primarily in the front one third of its body or on the sides, you're going to have a little bit of differences. You can be able to use darts or natural portions or some potential paints that can be able to be used to color it more uniformly. In fact, the couple that are on my far left portion, they're in the green box, they have a Rambele Ram that was exhibited at Newell Ram sale in South Dakota. They worked hard enough to get that one shaped out early enough that you could see that that one all has the same color and it's come back and shown as well. So a little bit there in terms of just grooming and fitting, and then also that hoof trimming. And so these are pictures of the two most accomplished sheep in this calendar year in 2019, the Supreme Champion Ram and you at the North American International Livestock position in Louisville. Both of these are meat breed sheep, as I said, and so consequently they were washed. And you would want to do that, certainly an extended period of time of even two weeks, three weeks before the show. And you'll probably want to do it again. And here's the fun part, Leigh Ann, this is an exciting thing is that as a livestock fitter, if you so have breeding sheep, you get to shape them in whatever way that you that will allow us you. And so you get to be an artist or an artist, if it makes it sound even more intriguing. But you have that opportunity to shape those to identify the faults. Now, the difference is as we move on to our market sheep, is that part of the things that we now have is that we now have a slick shorn animal. And so that's where showmanship becomes even more important because we can be able to then have to work on our way to help identify those weaknesses and strengths. So with these, these are washed and these are fitted and a wool card and the hand clippers are used more often than some people would prefer in their lives. And then also in terms of just hoof trimming, that should probably be done, in my personal opinion, two to three weeks beforehand because that allows us the opportunity that if we do make a mistake, that that hoof can grow back because the last thing that we want with our with our shiny animal on the limping and getting out there. Talk a little bit about the market lambs as well. And in fact, here's one that would be considered some similar in terms of presentation as we finish out that grooming and fitting portion is that this is a young lady that has is exhibiting a South Town U and part of a division winner there at Louisville this past year. So one of the things that we did there or she did is that we, of course, we watched it use a fine tooth, OK, comb and so the more teeth that there are in those combs, the tighter it gets, the smoother that fit job fits in. And there are those options to be able to use that. And then the South does in general will leave some wool over its muzzle and from the knee down and from the hot down. And those of you that have Hampshire Hampshire influenced market lambs also have some wool from the lower part of the body down to be able to be shaped or be able to be used and provide a little bit stouter of a bone work. Some shows will not allow extra wool on the belly line. So be careful that if you so follow those rules some people try to make them a little bit deeper flank. Other places may try to make them look a little bit shallower chested and and some of those places may or may not disqualify you from using exterior paints, OK, or or artificial paints and and colorings for those animals. And so from an integrity standpoint, though, Monodales are supposed to have black houses, South Towns are supposed to. OK, it's best in terms of integrity to make sure that we just follow home base rules and fit what we can and not alter any of the colorings artificially. And more importantly, from a market lamb standpoint, is that we don't alter any of the musculature or skin or hide or any of the features because there are practices that happen and are currently happening and previously happening that are lacking in terms of integrity of being able to produce true market animals. Leanne, I'm interested in providing an idea and seeing where we're at in terms of showmanship experience is a fantastic idea. So I just launched another poll. If you can go ahead and select what or how many years you have been showing sheep in showmanship. And so we can just get an idea. I have a couple of questions while you guys are doing polls for Dr. Hoffman. Gloria had asked what measurements would be recommended to feed your lamb? Do you want to touch a little bit on that? In terms of measurements, each of those individuals can be able to be evaluated. But I think that a couple of things that can potentially either get overlooked is that if we so choose a complete feed, then that allows us the advantage in working with those nutritionists. I would say that potentially about five pounds. And so between three to five pounds of feeds allows them the opportunity. We can guess that from a feed gain, those animals would be somewhere at six, seven or eight pounds of feed per pound of gain. And so those actually depends on where your timeline is. I really think that animals should be able to gain between a half of a pound to a pound of feed or pound of gain per day. And so if we provide approximately about four to five pounds of at least feeds of stuff to those, those and also I like to think if they aren't complete feeds or if we have maybe just a corn and oats and concentrate that you do allow a little bit of fiber or a little bit of higher quality alfalfas as well so that you can be able to to keep that room and going because we often have to think that we do have a room and it's animal and that's a part of their world as well. Mr. Rick Schmidt, what would you like to add in terms of nutrition and home based ideas? Well, I think it's really important to know what kind of animal that you're feeding to, you know, I guess if it's a market lamb then you've got obviously you want to keep those animals you know on a nice complete feed that is going to keep their coat looking really good. I think sometimes making sure that you have enough minerals in there to cover all the nutritional requirements is as important, you know, and if you get into the breeding sheep sometimes a little bit more hay would be fine. It's going to give them a little bit more fill to their middle. But really, I think it's dependent upon which class that you're wanting to participate in. And you know, I guess the other part is is that what's your animal look like? What are its faults? And what would you like to correct in its condition? And so that might indicate how much roughage versus what we might feed as far as roughage in relationship to a nice complete feed that comes from a dealer that's designed for what your end goal is and showing that particular animal. Thank you, guys. We're going to go ahead and keep on rolling. For those of you who are recording your questions in the chat box, so things about different breeds and stuff, we will definitely touch on those here shortly. So, all right, thank you. All right, thank you, Leanne. We're a half an hour into this evening's presentation on showmanship and we just got the opportunity to show some head placement. And Leanne, if you'll confirm that we've moved to the correct slide for everybody to be able to evaluate. Is that correct? That is correct. All right, and we had a great actual distribution of people of whether they were one year in or two or three or even more experienced. I think that you have a couple opportunities and as you walk into the ring, there's easily the fact that there's first impressions, no matter what. Now, I will tell you as an evaluator and judge that most commonly I'm probably, you know, and it's just human nature that you've already made a decision about a person of whether they're going to be competitive, maybe they're going to be competitive or they aren't within the first five to 10 steps. So that first impression is extremely important and we'll show that a little bit in terms of the video as well. One of the things that is also really kind of a big helpful part for me, identifying how to place that head. And so we have some examples here. And so the first young lady that's farthest to the left and I'll walk through this trio from left to right. So the young lady that's the farthest on the left is holding in a pretty ideal location for me. That neck is going perpendicular up and at a 90 degree angle. The front legs and the rear legs are correct in terms of where they are underneath that animal and there's a little bit of a brace for that one. So I like how that one's head placement is just farther away and so that's just fine. The young lady that's in the middle does have that head and neck carriage going up. But the challenge is that a couple different things. The nose is tilted up a little bit and some people like to do that. Certainly at that level. And I've been guilty as well of trying to keep the ears up. Maybe you think it makes the neck look more extended. But in fact here I think it just looks a little goofy. So the ears are a little pointed up too much straight to the ear. And in fact, the young lady there that has the pink shirt and this is actually where it was fighting her. This isn't normally how that lamb would have been presented. But when it did, here its nose is pointed to the top. And I think of it this way and for those young people that are showing is that by grabbing by the ears put your nose to the ceiling and then put a hand in your chest. You're probably not going to want to push back. That's what we're asking that lamb to. His head is pointed to the stars. The nose is pointed up. And then their knee is still in there of trying to get that lamb to brace. So probably not the best approach relative to head placement that we could be able to accomplish with her approaches. So heads up is again doing this right. Sun Lady has a Columbia U on the left. And she's doing a nice job. She has her fingers or index finger underneath the ear for that animal. And so that brings that up. It's close enough that you can still have it for the most part of the cheeks. We can be able to see the neck and doing a good job for entertain the value in the back. You dig and look just a little bit deeper. We've got, you know, a six year old gentleman that's got the sheep hanging out about ready to run away or at least going in forward. The gentleman in front of him has the nose pointed up. And so luckily for pictures that I took it towards the state fair, I picked the right one to provide clarity for. So I got lucky on that one. The tree of individuals that we have next in line. I'm going to start with the gentleman with the Woolbridge. He put Columbia at the front. So he is doing a solid job as well. One of the things is, is that his hand, if you, his left hand is closer to under its throat and not just under the jawline, you could potentially cause challenges if they resist that a little bit. And if they are not, if they have a problem, if there was too much pressure, I appreciate that he has control through his left hand. He has his right hand at the back of the neck so that if there was a problem that he would be able to have it under control. The rear legs, sometimes in junior shows or open shows, you can have somebody to help you if you so choose. So his brother is there at the back end, evaluating the rear legs. And I'll have to give him a bonus pointer and say, yes, please move one or the other to make that one a little bit wider in terms of its stance. But hopefully they can work in terms of teamwork. Maybe I just caught him at a bad time. Young lady with a dorset sheeps in the middle. Again, a white washed breed there. So she has her hands more so underneath the ears. It was up to me. I would move those back just a little bit closer to the muzzle and the cheek area. But she has certainly good control of that one. And the young lady's got a Hampshire sheep next in line. And if I was to guess which of this trio of use was the famous, I bet it's that third one. She's only got her hand under the jaw and feels confident about it. Her right hand is over the top of the back of the sheep. I consider that a little bit of a distraction. I don't need any need for that being there. And it certainly doesn't provide you the help that it would, if it was on the back of the neck, like the first gentleman's is a little bit here in terms of evaluations. And again, the lady on the left that I highlighted there does a tremendous job. The ears are up, but they're not pointed towards the sky. The nose is up at a 90 degree angle and allowing that nose to kind of drape and drop over your elbow or your forearm. So a few people here with different levels of experience to be able to evaluate. And I appreciate all of our youth that we have in North Dakota. If you're watching this, hopefully you can be able to evaluate that you did some things correct and we can prove on some as well. So hopefully not to be a negative by any means. But I think that the nearest or it's in the back with the poly pay type sheath there kind of has the bear hug going on. That's okay. Okay. There's pictures of me somewhere. I know there are where I was working the bear hug as well. And it was a little bit more experiences. We kind of get a little bit better. Open that up so that we can see. She's got her left hand under the john. In fact, her right hand is right at the top or the point of its shoulder. She's doing a super good job in terms of presenting a large animal. But in fact, for me, she could kind of shift that head back and make it just a little bit more particular that help us. And then the young lady that's a little bit shorter on experience right now, kind of just pulling that head towards her. You can see just kind of draping it over the leg. Similar as we move to the bottom row of people, young lady is kind of just pulling that lamb with her over its leg. We'd want to just kind of crank that up, make it a little bit more perpendicular on the top side. Young lady in the middle there. And the nose is a little bit more cranked up than I'd ideally like. And then the young man, suppose it for us in fact, that was after some pictures. He's doing a good job at presenting that one. Draw that head and neck back. Take a little bit more. I would set in there. Say, Dr. Hoffman, you are showing a lot of sheep here that look like they've been worked with quite a bit and that they're liking to be shown. Randomly we see lambs that are either ticklish or fighting the exhibitor or kind of jumping around when the judge comes to handle them. Do you have any secrets for our audience on how to address a misbehaving lamb? Okay. So if they're jumping, a couple of things that we can try to do is that if we can, a lot of the times there's may or may not be reasons for them to jumping. And so one of the things that first comes to mind in terms of that jumping is that how tight of a hole do I have on that head? How tight of a hole do I have it on that? Even the muzzle or the neck. And so be careful to not strain that animal by lifting it up too much or pointing its head high to the ground. One of the things I want to evaluate is you may be causing added stresses for them. The second thing is that I feel as though if you have a hold of the head with your left hand is that you can be able to put your right hand potentially on the top of a pike's shoulder. If that animal is going to jump, you at least know what's going to happen because you can kind of feel the body move and move back and forth and then potentially jump until you can be able to be there. If you just trying to do it with your front hand and you don't have your other hand back there to help or assist you, then you may be the one not with the jumping lamb. You may be the one that has to have the ring man or ring woman come help you to catch your shoe. So primarily evaluate how you're holding that head to see if there's anything that you can improve and relax a little bit. Animals respond to you and respond to your calmness and so hopefully we can be calm and be able to make those improvements. I'll try to keep moving Dr. Skirpe. We've got the front view to provide access for the judge. The view of the front of the third of the animal. So you can see that the judge is coming by the young gentleman here rocking the white shirt with 4-H clover like we roll here. That judge we don't know where he was prior to where this picture was taken. I don't know if you can see him in front of him, wherever it may be. But this gentleman is not right now. And so that judge can be able to see that front one-third of its body. The more challenging thing for me is when people move from one side to the other right when the judge is looking. I prefer that if you're going to move, which I'm okay with and prefer, but make sure you don't do it while the judge is looking and get out of the way. So I'm going to go with the young lady and efficiently. The young lady that as the market you lamb, absolutely does it perfect for me. Hands are at the cheeks. The head is up. I can see everything that I want. And that is a great presentation. The legs are a little wider than maybe what we need. But other than that, it's no reason to consider that that isn't the answer. So I'm going to go with the young lady. I'm going to go with the young lady. I'm going to go with the young lady of those animals. It's important to get that best look possible. On the side profile. These are the three individual pictures. Apparently with my editing. Hey, it looks like they're just in a line. So we'll just call it a win. How exciting. So the young lady that's farthest to the left, and we'll work through these again left to right. Some lady that's at the left. I'm going to go with the young lady of those animals. I'm going to go with the young lady of those animals again. Legs are absolutely in the right place. He's got a brace in with this, with the inside of her left leg. And now you will see with her right hand. She's going over the top line to the middle of the loin. And so she knows that this lamb kind of gets a little higher and it's loin when you brace it. And if you can decrease better, allow that one to not brace at the same level. So she's going to correct from that animal. The young lady that's in the second spot here with the blue lamb. And she's got the pressure on the inside of her left leg. But I like to think of racing as a zero to 100 scale. And this is just me. I don't know. Not many people probably think this way, but I think that this lamb is bracing at maybe 20%, maybe 30 at the most, because the way I see its head is pointed up to the top. Its neck looks unnatural. There's no flair in its leg and no shape. And it doesn't appear to be pushing off of it through legs. To me, the rear leg set isn't as firm as we'd ideally like. And so we have some challenges. That lamb is probably not bracing as much as we'd ideally like, particularly if we were going to get a handle on that one. The young lady here in third, okay, this lamb is bracing even less. Okay. And so a couple of reasons of why I see that. I look at the angle of the front legs. Angles of the front legs are pointed way too far towards the front. Or quick-ended. And so you can see the angle is no longer perpendicular to the ground. And since it's not perpendicular to the ground, I feel as though that lamb is kind of pulling back, not pushing back into her leg. And that lamb is kind of pulling back. You're not going to get as preferred of a handle as maybe you would like for those animals. So when we are evaluating the over bracing of the lambs, I said that you want to, to brace those animals. If you are over bracing them, you will do some things wrong and for those animals. And one of those things is, is that the bottom right picture is that that one in the bottom right really has most things going wrong in my opinion. That one's nose is going too high. The stress in the angles are at the back of that animal's head. We can kind of see it there. The gate caused a little bit of challenge, but at the hip loin junction, it's breaking. The right rear leg is too far back. That's just simply making a good animal into a poor animal. The advantages is that there is, I talked about the hip loin junction is the young lady that has the judge is handling that one. That's about where we would be able to evaluate the hip loin structure for those animals. Or just a little bit behind that. And in fact, the young gentleman here has already claimed to win in the FFA show and certainly has a nice lamb, but he's not helping it in terms of showmanship because this one when he puts his weight and power into this lamb, you can see there that it breaks at the hip loin and it certainly doesn't give that nearly as good of a look as you possibly can. We often have challenges of people that want to push too hard. And so you have to work with those animals to identify what is too much or where, where do I need to be of, of working with those animals on a, on zero or from going to no brace to getting into a brace. And certainly no one will tell you that a hundred percent brace is the answer anymore. Because you want to go in and keep your animal in a good composition. Here's three great photos that shows the evaluating over the front for rib, handling the loin and then handling the hip and hind leg as well. All three of these individuals are doing a tremendous job in the handling of those animals and doing a great job of, of the transition from that standpoint. Hey, Dr. Hoffman. Yes. We just had a question. Can you kind of talk about maybe some things you can do if they're bracing too hard? So I would say one of the things that I would say would be to take your knee and your pressure off of that front part of its shoulder. The other thing is that you're going to have to take your pressure off of that front part of its shoulder. The other thing is that some find advantageous is that you can hold the animal under the cheeks or under that muzzle. Okay. And under the jaw and just kind of shift them back a little bit. So push their head back a little bit, get them to shift their weight back to underneath them. And then so you kind of get a restart and then you can then push back in and start and then have contact with the inside of your left leg at that one's breastplate and then just start to ease into that lamb. And it might be at 25%. It might be at 50% that, that that lamb looks the best of whatever that may be. And then you just wait until you need more of when the judge is going to handle it, that you put more emphasis on it. North Dakota 4-H sheep showmanship educational video. This video is designed to assist youth in learning the proper practices to become more competitive when exhibiting sheep. This video is a visual supplement to the North Dakota 4-H livestock showmanship guide, publication GB092. Your first impressions are powerful, so begin strong. From the time the show starts, give the judge the appearance that you're in the show ring to win. Be confident in your mannerisms while remaining calm and relaxed. Showmanship starts from the time that you walk into the ring. Before entering the ring, you may want to know the patterns that the judge will be using throughout the show. Most judges will use the same pattern throughout. As you enter the ring, lead your animal from the left side of the lamb. Your left hand is under the jaw, not on the throat of the animal. Your right hand is placed at the back of the head with your thumb and pointer finger placed just behind the ears. This will give you more control when requesting your animal to move forward. Usually you will walk in a clockwise manner. If the judge wants you to lead in a circle or lead in line, the judge's preference is that you will do so quickly, without any resistance from your animal. If the leading around the circle, the judge is looking for how well the animal responds to your commands. Know when and where to stop. This is usually indicated by the judge or the ring steward. When requested to stop, make sure that you are in line. Whether the line is ahead to tail or side by side, once you stop in line, immediately set your animal's feet. The feet should be set squarely, yet comfortably beneath the animal. You may fix the top line or any other qualities which should be addressed at this time. Once your animal is in a position to where you want the judge to view it, find the judge while remaining one eye on your animal in the event that it may move, as well as one eye on the judge so you know where they're at. The judges traditionally will arrange the animals in a way to give the spectators the best view of the animals. If lined up head to tail or in a line, you'll want to place this line away from the spectators to avoid any obstructions, and when lined up side by side, give the view of the rear view of the animals to the spectators. For breeding sheep, keep the nose up. The nose and face should be flat. Always assure that the feet are set squarely and wide enough underneath of both ends of the animal. For market lamb, set the feet square, wide enough while remaining comfortable. It is acceptable to lift the front legs off the ground long enough to set the front legs side by side. If you are going to lift the front end of the lamb, do it quickly and discreet, and then place the lamb's feet back to the ground set the hind right leg by reaching over top of the lamb. Brace the market lambs by having the lamb push forward into the thigh of the exhibitor. Keep the lamb's head up high while keeping the face flat, and the neck and head and back of the sheep should all be at a 90-degree angle to give the best view of the animal. The feet need to stay on the ground. However, bracing should be done but not lifting during showmanship. Excessive showing, lifting of the lambs, pulling too hard on the head or neck takes away from the true qualities of the animal. The hip and loin areas have a tendency to become weaker while they resist the exhibitor which also takes away eye appeal and some of the showing and showmanship qualities of the exhibitor which is what the judge is really looking for during showmanship. We want you to be competitive but do not over show your animal. If you line up side by side, again, as soon as you stop, set your animal up in a way that you want the judge to see it. Make sure that you are in line with the first animal in line. Once you're in line, know where the judge is at. Give the judge the best view of your animal. Keep your animal between you and the judge. The exhibitor may move to either side of the animal. If the judge is on the left side of your animal, the exhibitor is on the right. If the judge is behind or to the right of your animal, the exhibitor is on the left side of the animal. This positioning is the same when leading. Lead your animal from the opposite side of where the judge is. It is more natural to lead lambs from the left side. However, judges may have you lead from the right just to see if you're moving from side to side correctly. Any time you're moving from side to side, never go around the back of the lamb and never turn your back to the lamb when moving around the front of the sheep. When moving from side to side, do it naturally. Not abruptly so it may startle your animal or the animals of the other exhibitors in the show ring. Do not move your animal unless requested by the judge. Once you're in line, don't be parading your animal out or resetting it unless absolutely necessary. This is an indication that the animal is not well trained and responding to the commands of the exhibitor. When the animals are in line, the judges may have youth move to a new position in line. When asked, lead the animal forward, turn your animal come back to the same position which you had just left, and move to the new position requested by the judge. While moving, remember to always keep the animal between you and the judge. You can move from left to right or right to left of the animal, but never go behind the animal. Showmanship is about how well you show your animal. The first priority is to make the sheep look the best that it possibly can. To make it look its best comes from exhibitors who always make sure to set the animal up quickly. The judge is also looking for animals that respond to the commands of the exhibitor without much fuss. The tenderness of the exhibitor to the request of the judge is important. Respond professionally and timely. Be alert and never get over-relaxed. The show may get long. But you need to remain showing at the top of your game throughout the show. The fitting or shearing of the animal is also important. We want to make sure that the animals are well represented and presented in a very professional manner. However, remember that this is a youth show and youth should be doing most of the preparation. Professional fit jobs should be given no advantage during showmanship. However, things within the control of the exhibitor, such as how clean the animal is, the ear tags are they clean, the ears and the hooves are all things that can be done prior to entering a showmanship contest. Dress code for the sheep exhibitors is an appropriate shirt with the 4-H emblem, dark jeans, a belt and hard-soled shoes. Also make sure that the clothes are clean. The exhibitors need to be well groomed. No hat or uncombed hair. Ladies should have hair that is well managed so it does not fall into their face during the exhibition. Questions are also fair game in any showmanship contest. Common questions may be, when was your animal born? What are you feeding your animal? What is your animal's weight? If you were to change your animal in any way to make it more competitive, what will it be? These are examples of strengths or faults in which your animal may have. How confidently and accurately you answer the questions may add points to your showmanship score. Showmanship is about character building. Sheep are a great way to learn about the livestock industry and build life skills. It is also about having fun and building lifelong relationships. So enjoy the experience and enjoy the show. Thank you. Thank you. Can you hear me and see a slide show? We sure can. Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for listening to that. We will show the location where you can grab that as well. Thank you to Mr. Rick Schmidt and his group at Oliver county extension at NDSU for helping to provide that information. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for having us. The opportunity to take some exciting questions. So that'll be good. And the first one to hear is a cordial yearling you. The young gentleman has his hands kind of so that the, just at the cheeks, you can be able to allow that nose to drop the ears. He's up a little bit. If we were to be too critical, this one, maybe the rear legs should be just a little bit wider, but it's a good job of presenting that yearling you. And then this is one of our showman that we've had in here several times. And in fact, here's the time that she smokes it and gets it dead right from the side profile. The pressure is on the back of its ears. She'll allow those years to come up just a little bit. Still drop that nose into your. Full arm or elbow. The rear legs are right on. If you guys are okay with it, I think these two individuals did a nice job here to transition in some way, but I think it's important. You know, it's a really important thing to have a little bit of a touch up strong. Here with our presentation. So I don't know what the correct answer is in terms of describing this, because each person is a little bit different now. And I just described this slide as intensity. And again, from game on to eye contact and attention to sheep. And just doing some things that we can be able to accomplish now, that's the most intense showman that I know in the region and and she's ready to go okay and so her lamb even though the front legs maybe aren't as set up as ideal as we need right now she's got her attention on the judge she'll be working on trying to get that animal up and get it presented as as best she can the two ladies I have to give a little bit of condolence that I took this picture before the judge was in the ring and so it wasn't just their lack of intensity but right now at least at this point their their attention certainly isn't quite on the sheep and let alone is it on the judge of what they're trying to accomplish but just a little bit of thoughts of how we can be a little bit better where do you want to put your emphasis in terms of accomplishing it a fun one or maybe the one or more intriguing questions is is the smiling and in fact some people of whether it's your parents or an extension agent or a leader that says go out there and smile and if you are enjoying yourself I know that you're enjoying yourself but I also know some people that will go out there and they won't smile because they're in it to play and to do as best they can so if it's natural for you that's fine but I will tell you as a judge there is nothing cornier than somebody that's doing a fake smile out there pretending that they're enjoying themselves and so take note to that 4-H leaders if that's a problem for you my apologies but it makes it weird being out there in terms of people that are fake smiling for us so confidence is one of the last things and and these two people you've seen them at both times and you've seen them do good work and you've seen them do places where they can be a little bit better again most of these were from the North Dakota State Fair that I grabbed from some pictures in 4-H FFA and in a little bit in the open class but both of these two young ladies are ready to win showmanship that sheep on the right is is much bigger than she would prefer and the young lady's got her market ULAM ready to go but you know your animal better okay and that's when some judges will switch an animal to a different person and so it makes it tougher you have to now evaluate that animal determine how that one can get better and how you can set up the legs and hold the head up walk at a steady pace okay and so you know the strengths and weaknesses make sure you're doing your job in terms of showmanship because that's really what it's about in fact showmanship is obviously not just going in for showmanship class anytime you walk in the ring we want you to be smooth we want to you to provide the best options that you can here's a couple fun pictures that I got to be part of the gentleman there is just a little between three and four years of age right there showing at the national western stock show that lamb actually that south down Ram actually grew up and won his class at Sedalia we didn't know that at approximately 10 days of age and here's a good friend of mine Abigail Donkers that does just does a great job and had done a great job this is I believe her last year showing at the Minnesota State Fair and so she worked with Dorsets trained those to work with them and to be able to lead with her and did a tremendous job never ever think that there's limits in terms of what you can accomplish and I would be welcoming to some questions and answers that we have and so for entertainment value I put a little bit in there of what I got to sort some livestock at Louisville and when I was an eight-year-old and then this past year's old school not because it's black and white but because that's a Hampshire sheep in the United Kingdom and so my moderators and Dr. Skirpe and those that have been talented I would welcome my questions as they fit and are presented from our talented audience thank you so much if you have to leave us we really really really appreciate you being a part of it and feel free to contact me my phone number is 701 231 BA so 701 231 BA or also via email at travis.w.hofman at ndsu.edu so I will open it up for questions I don't get to see that chat box but I know there's been a lot of action and we'll do our best thank you Dr. Hoffman I'm gonna kick it off first because I had a private question that perhaps Kurt and Brian didn't get to record so Gloria was asking what angle do you want their rear legs to have I don't know if you want to go back to a picture to show what's ideal or not but that was a great question okay so great question sorry now I'm going through too many of them so this one that is currently up that bottom one is way too extended all right um and and this is a good example all right and so um and in fact the girl that's in the middle um those are a little bit farther up underneath them than what I would prefer and so I'm gonna go back to um sorry thanks for the question but I am going to go to this because those are as correct as this young lady can make that one all right and so I knew there was a good reason to put this picture in here um and some may say are they a little bit too far back to me they're not um because that angle is still just fine because the from the hawk to the pastor and then down um are still at a good angle in my personal opinion Dr. Hoffman we're gonna go way back uh early in your presentation there was a question in your opinion what is the best way to make a good impression on the judge quickly okay good so um I think that a couple things so uh you're obviously gonna have eye contact with the judge to begin with but totally for me it's the head and neck carriage of how you're holding that animal and so uh again I'm uh I was lucky enough uh to be born uh short with a few uh fingers and so that's okay it wasn't a problem for me but what I did and what I really like is that if you have your hands up uh cradled under the jaw and then your hands at the um at the cheeks okay we know that we have that animal it's wanting to go and I keep that head up and perpendicular and then just let it go at a at a relatively efficient pace to get into the ring and so again it's how do you catch their opinion it's it's those first five to ten steps in I want that head and neck to be coming out and the other thing that you will see now is more judges are placing animals uh on the move and that's just because they're evaluating skeletal correctness more and so being able to keep your animal to uh to be alert and so sometimes those animals will just fall asleep a little bit and if you get a little bit of fire to them and just kind of tap them on the on the rib cage aside but be careful on that I don't want to go too far because there's few things less exciting than if you decide to slap or hurt or um abuse any animals by anything and I should never hear let alone see um a person's hand uh attacking an animal so keep that head up crank that up and then set the legs when you get to the side profile as efficiently as you can next question dr Hoffman uh an individual ask is it okay if I dye my hair and show with dyed hair quit laughing at me though okay so um is it okay if I dye my hair um I hope that I'll go through the chat box and and uh consider that maybe this is an entertaining one if you're you know plenty of ladies um primarily prefer to go a little blonder or a little darker that's your so choice if you so choose to use purple or green or whatever that may be um that's your personal decision um my job is not supposed to be to be able to evaluate you in terms of fashion um of either what you're wearing and that's why north dakota on a dress code is chosen to allow that it's primarily only um strict colored shirts is so that everybody's on a similar playing field um you know if if uh if green hair is you then then you be you okay uh I am I can't um I guess uh squelt somebody's creativity curt um but I hope somebody um either either that's uh their idea or whatever it may be now in terms of shirts um and just dress code if you were outside of the 4-H game man I always wore the brightest snappiest shirt I could so I guess I didn't dye my hair but I mean I want to be confident going in there and if you aren't squelched uh like at the Oklahoma youth expo or whatever everybody has to be wearing certain things uh certain 4-H or FFA or minnesota they have designated t-shirts that everybody's wearing um but you know if I'm going down to win Louisville and junior show I had the poppinous teal shirt that I knew so anyway hey dr we have one more question um the guy asked privately is what is the best feed to be feeding your sheep and what's a good time to start feed awesome I do not um particularly answer that one in terms of the best feed um so there's there's too many uh nutrition companies that I work with and I am not willing to uh to particularly answer that one what the difference is is to identify um what feeds there are available in terms of nutrition but primarily like I said the protein um and a higher protein uh complete feed at the beginning and and then trend that down to a lower part so you can kind of fill in the hip bone junction maybe just get a little bit more freshness to that animal um so and then the other part was um when to start feeding you should those animals um uh even when they are on the you or or born you know after they get uh two three weeks of age um we at North Dakota State University offer those sheep soybean meal um just as a supplement uh from the mother's milk and so you have the opportunity if you were to purchase them uh that they should go on feeds as as they can I will tell you that some of those more bag feeds are no doubt more expensive um and so if you are able to work with a feed meal or a nutrition person and the other thing that I would tell you with that is that there are people in your county uh no matter where you're at that do show some um sheep and lambs and so what I would do is I would try to reach out to them uh you don't want to be intimidated um by any means and most people are willing to share some things and and want others to succeed nobody that's a winner at the county fair the state fair the national fair wants her to not be anybody there so they want you to be involved and I would say to work with people that are either club leaders um or people that are in the sheep program uh to identify a feed program that can work in your area because there's so many different feeds and feed stuffs and resources um that you could mix up you know I mean we can have plenty of different options that could be in uh different feeds and so I apologize that I answered that one only at a halfway level of your preference but that's how we got to do this. Dr. Hoffman before we take some more questions from Brian and Kurt can you advance to that last page with all the other information on it so those that are getting ready to leave can see what other showmanship series we have coming up and then certainly have uh some contact information if they have any other further questions while we're finishing up oh go back one more there we go perfect okay Dr. Hoffman I have some rapid fire questions type questions for you I will try to be concise can I move to the right side of the sheep when I'm showing it yes I am fine with that um primarily our job is to show off that animal and so I always start and you do to uh young showman um by being on the left side of the animal um but my key point here is um and and if the judge if the judge is on okay so we're all looking forward and the judge is on my left side I've already switched to the right side of the animal okay and if they're coming to view the front uh I'm already on the right side and I'm waiting and I'm waiting and he's looking at the animal in front of me he's looking at my animal he's looking at the one behind me and then he's looking one more down now I can switch back to the left hand side or if I started on the left hand side step back so that I can um be able to um show that front of it and then wait for an animal wait for an animal okay and now switch because the one of my pet peeves there is it's good to switch but you don't want to do it right when you're evaluating it and maybe I'm um more uh lenient in terms of being on either side because I'm left-handed but um you have to work with what works best for you I am a small show person in the video I talked about reaching over the top to set the hind legs I cannot reach over the top I am too small I am only eight years old what do I do I cannot reach over the top either okay um so that's okay um yes in the video it did say reaching over the top I do not have a personal preference um in terms of going over the top I am just fine um with being able to particularly um grab the uh the rear legs that are on my side underneath the sheep I will tell you though as a young show person all right so don't tell anybody on this one but um it is okay to use your foot when you are seven years old and have a yearling Hampshire you okay so what you're actually going to want to do is if if you can't reach over the top and I don't expect it to is that you can try to crouch down and be able to reach with your right hand but if that's not the case either there's plenty of people in the beginner division that you have two things that you can be able to use as a resource the first one is holding the head and pulling it forward or pushing it back and so you're allowing that body weight to either move forward or backward hopefully that animal will square up and if it didn't work or if I have three out of the four and I need to move the front leg and I know it's a long ways down there it is okay to use your um foot if you so wish please don't consider that um the answer but you know what I would prefer that you showed effort to try to improve your animal than to just leave it what will happen if my sheep gets away from me in the ring how will the judge respond to me Kurt I'm glad that you asked your own question okay so um with that so we want this to be a learning experience okay and so the opportunity is is that we there will be people hopefully in the ring that can help you to corral that animal and to get your animal back in line your job is to finish as strong as you can okay did something bad happen absolutely is something bad happened in life for people right now okay probably so and so our job is to show some perseverance to finish strong and the judge potentially um and I do this and many others um will acknowledge you at the end before you go out and say you know what young man young woman uh thanks for your hard work and finishing strong and helping to be part of this okay will you win showmanship that that week or that time chances aren't the best um but I want you to get better and to work out there and a lot of times I will like if an animal if a beef animal would step on somebody's toe or if a sheep gets loose I want to at least acknowledge that hopefully you still have a positive experience and can um and want to be out there when you do it again my sheep is not behaving very properly when I'm in line side by side or head to tail and I need to move it is it okay to turn my sheep in a circle to reset it yes uh good question uh sorry I didn't accomplish all this um I am just fine um turn into the animal do not pull the animal around you and in fact I didn't do a good job of moving from one spot to the other spot is pull forward like if you were side by side you would pull forward turn into the animal and then go back through that hole and turn into the animal one more time and you're back in if you're on the side profile it is just fine to take a uh a quick lap that allows you to reset but make sure that you get square oftentimes too many people like to sit themselves out front and try to be the center of attention and and over showing at that point doesn't do you any good get back into line but yes that allows you the chance and probably allows your sheep just a little bit of chance to relax as well thank you my lamb spooks because of other lambs and or maybe the audience spook my lamb what should what should I do uh great question so hopefully um to follow up on the last one is that we still have the lamb uh in our control uh we talked a little bit about if they were jumping of making sure that we have potential pressure at the top side of its shoulder or at the very least um also our hand at the back of the neck um but what I could tell you I guess that's a trickier question but my personal answer for that is that animals respond to you as well and so I would do what I would do is I would take a deep breath because that animal yes it isn't working for you but the worst thing that you can do is to get fired up and to fight back with it I know um one of my siblings when we were showing would try to over show and would try to set the rear leg even if it was at 90 percent or 95 percent like oh man I can get that better and sometimes it's okay to take a deep breath be the calm one in the situation and hopefully your animal responds I hope that isn't a cop out answer but work with those animals at home obviously um to make sure that you can be able to um to respond with them and I think the best thing that you can do is take a step back and just say hey I can be part of the solution and be calm as well I just can't get my sheep to move I am working at working it and it is so stubborn any tips um so I mean one of the important things is that hopeful if if we have more than one sheep okay um if we have two sheep three sheep four sheep would be to walk those um just as you're out on a Tuesday evening or a Monday evening uh this night so um we have those on our halters and just just you know some of the times they're going to resist that and then certainly the first times that you are going to do that they're going to want to resist it if I was going to exercise some lambs and this was one of the problems is that I was going to take them out on uh tonight's Monday night so we're going to take them out on a halter is that don't feed them until they get back okay and so if you don't feed them until they get back they know that there's a reward and so if you can be able to kind of give them a little bit of a a head game of an incentive then when we're coming back we know those animals will learn that they want to do that now hold them by the head okay disregard the halter and see if we can be able to kind of work with them and train them and then say when they do want to go that I could pull back a little bit and so I guess I'm using dessert um as uh as a as an opportunity to win with that one it was talked about in the video Dr Hoffman about lifting the lambs to set the front feet can you uh the question was is it okay to lift the lambs and just take a short response to that okay thank you uh so so some individuals find it advantageous to lift the lambs I will tell you that when you are showing at the highest level there are people that can do it without lifting those lambs um but if you're going to set the rear legs at the very most that you so desire to do would be just a little bit of of weight uh or or pressure at the back of the ears and the back of the neck to just prop them up so that they set those front legs um down underneath them what becomes more of a challenge is that those producers and were past this for the most part ladies and gentlemen but people would um lift their lambs and then put their knee into them uh to brace them and so when you would do that then um then they would go too much and so if you have to or so choose to lift the legs to set the front legs only for a moment of time lift them up put them back down and then get some square if that's something that works for you best um then then that's okay but I would also tell you that I would prefer that you did not do that while the judge was looking at you so the tricky one because that won't help you uh if you can do it while the judge is looking at you it's best not to yeah remember what the purpose of showing is and I guess remember that we are the advocates for the the livestock industry and remember that there's people watching your every move and so some people may deem that as maybe not the right thing to be doing to be um you know Travis mentioned the slapping or the lifting and all those other things that that you might be able to see in a show ring remember that people are watching and uh one of the things that we had as uh when I took an ethics course about um but showing livestock it said if you have to feel like you don't want to tell the judge the whole truth about whether you should or shouldn't have done something you probably shouldn't have done it and so so think about that just for a minute um uh you know if it's again we want to make sure we're teaching the ethics as well as good stewardship of our animals and uh and and really showing uh the people that are not in the egg industry why we're doing this so be careful about about doing things that you may deem to be unethical thank you for the clarification Rick and I just said don't do it in front of the judge so I don't want to be the one justifying it so you know work at home to try to at least minimize that or get that out of your uh showmanship skills I think that would be best Dr. Hoffman I knew to the sheep industry I can buy some tunas breed should I should that be shown as a meat breed or a wool breed uh the tunas is considered a meat breed um primarily because the quality of the wool is not particularly um high quality and so what you will do with the tunas is that you will also wash those the two weeks in a week before the show the differences with the tunas obviously you have a red head but you also have a cream colored wool and so if you are going to wash them until they turn bright white you will be washing forever and strongly disappointed so they have a cream of um color of wool and uh but please wash them they're considered a meat breed what what tip would you have for me as a beef guy that I've never shown sheep before but I want to prepare myself for the round robin contest um so good question um two things all right so keep the head up and keep the legs um square so so I mean those are those are in order and then the next one um would would be bracing at at some level okay and so keep the head up get particularly the rear leg square and then brace but brace it most likely 50 percent curt because if you just try to put your knee into all of them uh their legs are going to go back from behind them they're going to drop on their top and so don't over brace because that allows you to look like the beef guy that hasn't ever shown a sheep and I have one last oh you got one more I have one last I have one last question then I'm going to turn it over to you Brian you might have some others that you wrote down um what kind of tips do you have Dr. Halfman for a young person to we're teaching this lamb how to brace at home we're practicing and we're practicing what tips can we use to brace that lamb good thank you and in fact this is the thing that provides integrity to our industry as well because there are um you know methodologies that some people may choose that I don't condone and so some of the things that I like that um is is what you're doing is you're providing that animal um a little bit of challenge behind them and and how I say this is that my favorite is that you push with your with the inside of your leg um and let them go backwards and of course they're like okay sweet this is reverse which is not what you want um but to identify um or make a area that's uh that's a puddle in the yard okay or at least some water because that water scares them and so if you back up and then you push your leg into them and let them back up two steps and then the third step and they're like whoa I'm in the water I'm falling off the edge of the world then they're like boom I'm going and I'm giving it a try forward the other thing is is that if you develop a small platform of whether that platform is six inches up um or you know which you could just put you know two by fours or two by sixes over a plywood or whatever that may be or you could maybe just use your trimming stand that's probably a foot and so I start on the trimming stand and then I put my weight into its um breastplate until that rear leg falls off the back okay and then obviously I'm not hurting the animal um because that's just providing some some intuition that oh maybe I want to move forward those are some things that have worked for me other people might have uh better things but it provides some uncertainty that now hey I want to go forward and I want to try to brace. Thank you Dr Hoffman. I got a few more questions here they just keep on rolling in we're going to try group a few of these together as they're kind of similar. First question we're going to kind of go exercise route here and first question that I've got is do you need to stretch your sheep uh so they aren't stiff before the show if so what stretches and how do you do them? Hey um what I can say um Brian and Dr Skirpe is that you need to do the stretches all right as a showman or the showman need to okay so that you're agile enough that you can reach over and grab that rear leg the sheep will be fine um they they will be just okay uh that that isn't anything uh so think about it uh ladies and gentlemen uh you know these sheep uh if they're living in a pasture they've already put on several miles or wherever it may be they'll be just fine um I don't have any particular um pregame plans that they need or or laps that they need to accomplish. I would prefer them be ready to go than worn out. So Dr Hoffman keeping with the exercising what would your recommendations be for exercising those uh those lambs at home getting them ready for the fair is a one time a week several times a week should they be walk ran run uphill what is your suggestions there for exercising and getting these lambs ready for the fair um that's a great question and I I would welcome in other people's thoughts and ideas on this but I think at least every other day potentially each night that you get a mile on them or if you do it every other day that you go two miles like I said um you have to go somewhere and you have to come back and so I um always considered it a quality idea to walk a mile with those animals and then know that the the mile on the return is much faster um because uh then I take the halter off if I so choose and uh and they're motor and going. Okay. At least uh every other day in my personal opinion um particularly as we get back behind there but other people may have other ideas and I welcome that as well. Okay uh we got some grooming uh questions and we're gonna start with uh can you clean your sheep uh with a hose outside or is there different methods uh different what kind of soaps should a person use uh different do different soaps do different things uh kind of lead into fungicides. Okay um so um just a quick interpretation from the question Brian um yes you can uh um you know wash your animals with a hose outside for all you parents out there the fathers and the mothers uh it's better than a hose inside to wash your lamb so I don't know how that was uh particularly written but um yes so yeah um if you use um a hose now there are any of those particular um mild soaps of a dawn dish soap type thing will work uh a lot of the livestock supply stores will sell um the different soaps for you the one that works so um the best for me uh particularly in terms of meat breed sheep also can can be a product called Orvis ORVUS I believe or Orvis um so uh that helps it is a lot stronger type of a soap as well to kind of get a lot of that dirt out um of course there's some of those other ones um a fungus side we didn't really talk about that and so sheep have the opportunity to potentially get club lamb fungus or what can be considered ringworm uh the more you travel the more you're exposed to it uh the more hard work that you can be able to do um to to try to wash those before you leave and when you get home and um be able to to try to get those uh sheep clean uh so that you don't cause biosecurity because once you get ringworm and fungus on those lambs then you aren't allowed to go uh to the store because we don't let those animals in into uh to shows that have a pelt or hide challenge that can be infected so fungicides is certainly a good way to uh to try to help you but you have to realize at any time that you go out um you're at risk uh from a biosecurity standpoint on that one. Okay Dr Hoffman this individual's only shown calves they're wondering can you damage the wall or skin by scrubbing them too hard or too much? I sure appreciate that forager than the one that forgets to knock out all the uh the mud and the manure from the from the bottoms of the legs so I think you'll be okay um you know I think that uh you know what I would say is don't use the hard bristled rice root brush that Kurt talked about in last weeks okay because that will uh you know just cause a little harder because that's job is to uh stimulate the skin and to stimulate hair growth but uh you you should be okay. Okay uh how often would you say a person should wash their sheep at home or at the fair? Um so I mean the the one that matters is the one that's that's right before the show so if that's a day or two um at the at the very most um that in front of the show but that's up to you um I think that if you do it good uh the week before if you just have a market lamb um then that's okay if you've been showing it a couple times or want to get another layer off of the wool um then you can wash them the other thing is is that a lot of times people want to wash or to use the clipper on those animals while they are still wet and a lot of times that works a little bit better so there's no um particular um limit if you if you know what if I got an eight year old and that uh uh or there's an eight-year-old in your 4-H club or a 12-year-old and they say you know what I want to go wash the lamb uh as a 4-H leader and a parent then you say yes yes sir ma'am go make that happen that's just fine I don't get in the way of people's work ethics uh dr hoffman an individual wants to know if they can use a white powder to make them whiter on showday um well lian smirking so only illegally um but uh I have seen that done uh what I can do is I could tell you that you need to confer with your rules um so that will that will depend if it's an open show or if it's a a 4-H and junior show um uh on occasion it does happen but I think that in terms of in terms of just improving your animal I'm not convinced that it changes the animal at least to a strong um approach so I don't think that you're getting much uh accomplished from that but the other thing is is that you want to be careful if you so choose to do that the other um that it's probably not a good idea because there's the chance that the judge puts their hands on it and poof gets baby powder or whatever it may be and then you look like an idiot all right and so if you uh if the judge slaps their hand on your sheep and there's a cloud of powder no longer did you look like the cool person with the white sheep now you just look like the idiot didn't didn't know what you were doing so I apologize that I kind of um split integrity and intellect but I don't think you need to do that sheep or white enough pelted you'll be fine hey Dr. Hoffman we got a couple more and I don't know how much longer Leanne's gonna go here but uh a real uh good question here uh show has two judges in the show ring uh how should an individual uh handle that situation who should they look at especially if judges are on opposite ends of the ring um great question I like that Brian so the show committee if you are not the first person in um you know if there are other people that are in in the showmanship then I would go to the front table and ask say who is the lead judge and who is the associate judge okay and so that's how I would handle that um is at least go to the front table and say hey you know I'm a senior I've been I've been busting it hard all summer I want to know who the lead person is and then you identify that and they should clarify that um that um either Jim or or Julie whoever it is whichever one of those there is one of those people should be the lead judge and they should try to do that if they don't um then that's your job is to battle both both people but I if I was not the first one in I would go to the front table and ask who is in charge here Dr. Hoffman uh this Kurt I have done some co-judging with other judges and we have always made sure that we told the announcers that yes to let the showman know who the lead judge was so hopefully the judges will also take that into consideration Dr. Hoffman a question was do little kids have to use halters no little kids don't have to use halters uh if you've made it to second level already at the age of eight and have enough comfort that cupid your 114 pound uh market u-lam works well for you and you've developed a relationship then go out there and do it and and win the beginner division I mean that's exciting but of course not you certainly don't need to in the show ring and I feel as though those that that don't have the halters I know that they are more confident and work potentially more at home that they feel comfortable doing it Dr. Hoffman how can you tell them or how can you tell when a sheep is fat okay good um so the difference is is that um a little bit in terms of just shape thank you so much so so we have a a coke bottle and if we think of a coke bottle it goes like this right that same shapes happen with a market animal whether it's beef pork or sheep or goats okay and so those that are trimmer though one of the quick places that the judge will evaluate is underneath the forearm okay so over the ribs and you will be able to feel if you can feel the ribs this is a good example okay if you can feel the ribs much like your knuckles those animals are still plenty to trim okay if you can feel the animal and it feels like the back of your hand you now have a very very chubby sheep if it feels somewhat like the first between your first and second knuckle then the would probably be a close spot and so you're going to feel over its top they're going to cover in and then instead of being a coke bottle they become a boat or a canoe shape Dr. Hoffman oh go ahead I have a private question that just got asked and this is a fantastic question given the current situation I have an individual that's located in New York and with her stay at home order she is not allowed to go to and do anything with the lamb so do you have anything or suggestions that they might be able to work on without even being able to work with their lamb um yes so there's always some things that we can be able to do okay feel free to go back and listen to that showmanship video that that we have directed also there are feed companies now that are now putting out some showmanship ideas and so you have if you have availability to uh to an ipad or computer and and internet access there are other showmanship resources the other thing that I would tell that young man or woman is that also it's part of understanding the sheep industry and so look and try to identify a sheep um fact sheets or knowledge or chapter from an animal sciences high school book whatever that may be and so learn about the sheep industry so that you understand more about your um project when you go do it of how long are those animals bred what did we feed those what could we feed those what cuts of meat are most prominent where are the different um options and so my apologies dr skirpay just because you're on uh stay at home and hiding behind this doesn't mean your excuse for being a champion uh a showman so go ahead and learn about your project just a little bit more thanks dr hoffman uh I want to kind of wrap up here I know we got a ton of questions yet that we haven't uh scratched surface on uh but uh wait dr hoffman uh what would be a typical ideal weight for a market lamb uh for an individual to go into a uh show also what would be a good weight for a breeding you such as maybe a suffoc you okay um market weights uh I would prefer the champions to come out of the market weight of approximately 130 to 150 pounds should catch those but that doesn't have to be that case but I would aim for between 130 and 150 um and the correct weight for a breeding you that is actually too much um probably not enough information to answer it because a tunis um yearling you only weighs 170 pounds and a suffoc um you lamb uh in the middle of the summer may also weigh 170 pounds so that's not quite enough information um for um me to uh to answer that one I apologize but what I would say in terms of the breeding sheep is that I want them on a positive plane of nutrition which means those use are gaining weight and it's fitting their body style all right thank you dr hoffman I have put uh both mine and his email in the chat so if there are further questions that you guys want to ask certainly feel free to email us if you want to tell us what you liked about this so we can um have an awesome quote from you that says you know something you learned that would be also fantastic we just really want to thank you guys for joining us today we know that your time is valuable and we are so excited that you chose to come and visit us and be with us this evening to learn about sheep showmanship and uh we really thank dr hoffman for taking time to really share his expertise and wisdom with us as I said that this will be recorded so you can always go back and look at um this recording if you forgot the answer to one of those questions so thank you guys um we hope you have a really great evening stay healthy stay safe and good luck this year definitely keep an eye out on the virtual livestock shows they're starting to pop up given our current situation so if you want to follow us on facebook I am certainly always posting updated material I'm going to put that link in the chat box right now um I'm always posting opportunities for virtual livestock judging contests for both horse and livestock shows and virtual stuff and so um there's some fun opportunities so thank you guys so much and I hope you guys have a fantastic evening