GALLERY: Barn views
R. HANS MILLER | Hagadone News Network | UPDATED 2 years, 6 months AGO
Jenna Zemke and Hayden Kline stop for a photo with their feathered entries in the poultry barn at the Grant County Fair Tuesday morning. Both are participants in Moses Lake Future Farmers of America.
R. HANS MILLER/COLUMBIA BASIN HERALD
A pigeon raised by John McGonicgal of Ephrata’s JB’s Lofts. McGonigal raises multiple breeds of pigeon, including squab. He is a member of a small club dedicated to the hobby of raising pigeons.
Diesyl Koehn of Royal Slope brought this Jersey cow named Izzy to the fair for 4-H. The 23-month-old beef entry was bred by Fekkes Feedlot.
Bovines of a feather, Kolby and Annie, rest as the heat at the Grant County Fairgrounds began to churn its way in Tuesday morning. Temperatures were in the triple digits for much of the day.
Exhibitor Cole Rickert displayed this diagram above his stall showing the appropriate locations for injecting cattle with antibiotics. A large part of Future Farmers of America, 4-H and Grange youth programs revolve around educating young people in best practices in agriculture.
Fair participants keep pigs cool with a hose while simultaneously using plastic pallets to keep swine from fighting for attention. Temperatures were quite hight Tuesday with a high of at least 103 in Moses Lake, where the fairgrounds are located. Barns had hoses, misters and fans running in an effort to help attendees and animals stay cool in the extreme temperatures.
Lauren Chamberlain of the Warden Future Farmers of America’s entry, Fancy. The sheep is a Hampshire-Suffolk crossbreed weighing in at about 100 pounds. A second place ribbon was hung with the entry card above Fancy’s pen.
What barn gallery would be complete without a sheep named Barney? Barney is a 126-pound Hampshire-Suffolk mix raised by Gabby Detterrera of the Ephrata Future Farmers of America, and is dressed quite stylishly as many of her fellow lambs were.
Buckwheat is a six-month-old Suffolk-Hampshire mix from GQ’s 4-H out of the Quincy area. He was raised by Klare Gans and weights in at 125 pounds, according to his entry card.
Equestrians await judging results during Tuesday morning's horsemanship competition. See our story in tomorrow's Lifestyle section to learn more about the participants, hooved and booted.
Managing Editor Rob Miller is a 4-year U.S. Army veteran who grew up in Western Montana in a community about the size of Soap Lake. An honors graduate of Texas State University, he enjoys spending time with his wife, Brandee, and their three dogs, Draco, Pepper and Cinnamon. He has one son, William. During his free time, he enjoys photography, video games, reading and working on the house he and his wife bought in Ephrata. He is passionate about the First Amendment and educating communities. | August 16, 2023 1:30 AM
MOSES LAKE – A large part of the fair in any rural area is friendly competition among area youth agricultural organizations such as 4-H, Future Farmers of America and The Grange.
The Grant County Fair is no different with hundreds of animals brought to the fairgrounds each year to compete for ribbons and to ensure the next generation of agriculture professionals learn their trades or, if they don’t intend it as a career, have fun with animals while learning valuable life lessons.
The gallery below represents a few of the breeds brought to the fair, though not intended as a comprehensive coverage of the entries in the 2023 competitions.
Editor's note: If your child or a child you know did well during this year's fair showings, please send a photo to [email protected] for consideration for publication. Please make sure to include the child's name, club participation (e.g., Quincy 4-H), the name of the animal pictured with the child and any other information you feel is relevant.
ARTICLES BY R. HANS MILLER
Feb. 10 initial election results
EPHRATA — Voters were asked to approve or reject educational programs and operations levy requests from a number of Grant and Adams county school districts in Tuesday’s special election. Voters in the Ephrata School District and East Adams Rural Healthcare decided the fate of specific proposals. Unofficial results released Tuesday night are listed below with additional votes coming in via mail over the next few days. Mailed-in ballots must have been postmarked by Feb. 10, 2026 to be counted.
COLUMN: It’s amazing what you can learn ...
Four years ago, almost to the day, my wife and I closed on the first home either of us have owned, a stunningly Pepto-pink house in Ephrata with what we thought of at the time as “character.” It turns out, that character is really, in many ways, a lot of work. Work I hadn’t done much of since helping my dad out when I was a kid a few decades ago. Still though, all of the work I had to relearn or learn – thank goodness for the folks at Ace, Lowe’s and experts on YouTube – has been incredibly rewarding.
Take a wander, see a wonder
MOSES LAKE — Living in Central Washington has a lot of perks, and one of those is the opportunity to see a variety of wildlife.