At this year’s Oklahoma Youth Expo, touted as the world’s largest junior livestock show,
there were a record breaking number of entries, more than 22,000 across various
livestock categories including market steers, barrows, gilts, market lambs, ewes, market
goats, and does.
Included in that enormous number were a handful of Marietta FFA members whose
entries did well at the expo.
Audriana Rodriguez’s light cross barrow was sixth in class and 11 th overall. Audriana
was also a Sale of Champions exhibitor.
“I wasn’t expecting to make the sale,” said Audriana, “but seeing the judge walk to me
and point at my pig for 11 th overall was pretty awesome! None of this would have been
possible without my parents and Willie Kirkpatrick.”
Her brother Colton’s Duroc barrow was third in class and 17 th overall. Maddi Willis’s
crossbred market steer won sixth in class. Allie Hice showed a breeding doe in Class 5.
“I am beyond proud of this group of students,” said advisor Kelsi Kamesch. “Showing
livestock is not easy. It takes a lot of time in preparation for shows. I also want to
shoutout to the parents and grandparents for all the time and money they put into the
kids’ projects – it’s extraordinary. Just like it takes a village to raise a child, it takes a
village to raise livestock and get them ready to show.