00:00 - Good afternoon! Thanks for coming out to the 4-H FFA youth rabbit show at the

00:06 - Bloomsburg Fair. My name is Jesse Rumbinger and I'm from Dauphin County which is

00:12 - about an hour and a couple minutes south of here and we are going to start

00:21 - off with youth meat pens. So if the children,

00:25 - the youth want to bring them up, we'll

00:29 - get them weighed and inspect it and then we'll kind of go over the judging of them.

00:37 - I try to comment a little bit as we go

00:40 - through. Now tell you what we're looking for.

00:44 - Obviously it's a little tough with a handheld mic and handle in

00:58 - the rabbits so once they get started. So while the kids are bringing them up for

01:06 - anybody out in the crowd or I mean FFA, 4-H leaders, etc. Everything's

01:11 - governed by the American Standard Rabbit Breeders Association.

01:14 - If you are interested, it's right out 80 and Knox PA. There is a museum out there.

01:19 - You ought to go check it out. You can go in there and see the history of the rabbit

01:24 - industry and that headquarters is not just for Pennsylvania but it's also

01:28 - for the all United States and global country. Especially if you're head in

01:33 - west on 80, plan to take yourself a visit to the headquarters. So I believe

01:40 - there's five pens, one, two, three, four, five. Once they all get up, basically

01:46 - there's a standard of protection or a guide that we go by. So here's what we're

01:49 - looking for. We need three rabbits that are 10 weeks of age and younger.

01:55 - They need a way between three and a half and five and a half pounds. They all need

02:00 - to be the same breed and variety. So we're looking for uniformity. We're looking

02:07 - for type. Most importantly, we're looking for meat condition, right? It's three

02:13 - rabbits. So you want triplets. They all want to look identical. If you have

02:18 - two that are great and one that's weak or one that's strong and two are weak,

02:22 - that's not uniformity. So think about this. If I had two other brothers that

02:27 - just looked like me, that's what uniformity is. So this is a pretty tough

02:34 - project because it starts technically 14 weeks ago with breeding. The rabbits

02:41 - kindle in 30 days. So once they kindle, then you have 10 weeks of growth and you

02:47 - need to get them from zero, which is a couple ounces, all the way up to 5.

02:52 - 8 ounces. If it's 5.9 ounces, you get disqualified. You're overweight. If you

02:59 - were under 3.8 ounces, so it would be 3.7 ounces, you're disqualified. So when

03:05 - you start thinking about youth, the market projects that we have here, it's not

03:09 - just one steer, one pig, one goat, right? It's three animals that you are

03:15 - constantly focused on feeding on a daily basis and making sure they grow at the

03:20 - same rate. So it's a fun project. It's an accelerated project and it's a

03:26 - rewarding project. So after we get done placing these animals, don't be afraid

03:31 - to come back Friday with the youth livestock sale. I believe it's in this

03:36 - building, isn't it? It is in this building and then all the youth will be

03:40 - selling their animals, whether it's big beef, dairy beef, you know, swine, pigs,

03:45 - sheep, and rabbits, right? Goats are in there. So you can come back at the end of

03:49 - the fair. So meet competitions as growing super fast within the youth and it's not

03:56 - just here at the Bloomberg Fair. It's all over the United States. There's heavy

03:59 - meat cane competitions. The next largest one in the state of Pennsylvania is at

04:03 - the Pennsylvania Farm Show. You're probably going to see about 40 to 50 pens there.

04:08 - So again, kids are starting to breed right now for that project. So once we

04:13 - get started, I'm going to put the microphone down. I'm going to weigh each

04:17 - rabbit to make sure they are consistent weight. I'll write down the weight and then

04:22 - we'll go and evaluate it. Once I have them picked out, I will then place them

04:28 - accordingly and describe the faults, the positives, et cetera, what they should

04:32 - be looking for. So I'm going to put the mic down and we'll get started.

04:49 - Okay, so pen number, pen number, 15.

05:07 - So we are 4.4 ounces. Okay, we need to inspect it now. So we'll turn

05:15 - the rabbit over. Gotta have good teeth. Gotta have four toenails on the front.

05:21 - Four toenails and a, I mean, one too claw and four toenails. Four on the back.

05:28 - We also need to make sure that we have a good straight tail and then there's no

05:38 - abscesses on the bottom. I'm going to put this one back. Just make sure here.

05:51 - This is 4.8 ounces and we're going to do the same thing all over again.

06:12 - Flip the rabbit over, check his toenails. Pcesses, very good.

06:30 - Well, this would come in at 4.13 ounces. So this pen here is 4.

06:35 - 4 ounces, 4.8 ounces and 4.13 ounces. So fairly consistent in uniformity. There's

06:47 - about a quarter pound of gap and more like a half pound of gap. Okay, excellent.

06:58 - Slide down. This pen here is pen 13. This is another New Zealand white pen.

07:15 - This one lays four pounds. We're going to flip it over inspection. If for

07:18 - some reason it has bad teeth, maybe a broken toenail, mismatch toenail, missing

07:25 - toenail, broken tail, any abscesses, it would be disqualified. That means it

07:30 - would be taken out of the competition because it didn't meet the grade of the

07:35 - animal. As we're doing it, what we're doing is we're looking for good shoulders,

07:39 - mid-section, hindquarter. We also want to see it fill it in the lower hindquarter and

07:43 - we also check out the conditioning coat. So I want to set this one right here.

07:55 - This one on the scale. 4.2 ounces. Okay, you guys watching this. The same thing,

08:03 - just do a quick inspection of it. Teeth toenails.

08:21 - Last one. If you want to move that move, then you can.

08:29 - 4.5 ounces. So when you're looking at consistency, this one's very consistent.

08:37 - It's within five ounces of one another. So a little bit more consistent.

08:45 - In weight versus the first pen we looked at.

08:59 - Okay, excellent. We're going to slide down to the silver fox.

09:28 - 10 number, 14, 3.10. This is particularly, you definitely don't want to see any

09:35 - white toenails on this. They should be a darker toenail.

10:03 - 3.9 ounces.

10:18 - Kind of shift this way now.

10:27 - This is pen 12.

10:51 - 4 pounds.

11:12 - 4.05.

11:32 - There's something that you actually can see the point system of of how it works.

11:52 - 3.12. So this one here is about 9 ounces, slightly different one another.

12:16 - Okay. This is pen 11.

12:29 - This is the Californian breed.

12:39 - 4 pounds.

13:10 - For 12, so this particular pen, we are about three quarters of a pound

13:18 - already different in weight. So a little bit spread in the scale of uniformity a

13:23 - little bit, like to see a little bit closer.

13:38 - 4.08.

14:00 - So this is the last rabbit we get to inspect, and

14:03 - then what we're going to do is we're going to go

14:11 - through and now check out meat qualities, and

14:14 - we're going to start comparing them to one another.

14:23 - To the touch, they should be hard like a brick,

14:27 - very firm and flesh. They also should be very

14:31 - smooth over the spine. They should carry the loin

14:34 - from the shoulders, the midsection all the way

14:36 - down to the lower hindquarter. That's what we're

14:39 - looking for, meat quality. Basically this is 100%

14:42 - white meat, so it'd be like the breast of the chicken.

14:51 - This is a great example of right here.

14:53 - See how full that carry is all the way down to the table.

14:56 - You want it very full all the way in the lower hindquarter.

15:01 - This one here has a little bit of

15:04 - being a little pinched in that lower hindquarter, lacking fullness of that lower

15:09 - hindquarter.

15:15 - Check out these.

15:28 - [Music]

15:58 - [Music]

16:27 - Here's a pin that's very uniformed in shape.

16:31 - They all are right around the same size.

16:34 - They're all about the same width in the midsection, the

16:37 - hindquarter, the lower hindquarter. There's a lot of

16:40 - consistency in this pin. You can see how uniform they are.

16:43 - That is something that we're looking for

16:46 - is consistency and uniformity.

16:48 - A little bit softer and flesh, like to see a little bit more

16:52 - firmness, but still a good example of what we're kind of looking for in a meat pin.

17:23 - Now I got some white New Zealand's. These are very firm to the touch.

17:45 - Pretty nicely uniformed, they're all about the same

17:48 - and width of the shoulders. With the midsection,

17:51 - they're nicely balanced animals. You don't see

17:54 - any holes or pockets in there. You also can see

17:56 - how they're all nicely filled into that lower hindquarter.

17:59 - Very good condition of coat and that's

18:09 - what you're looking for. Balance and uniformity. Nice pen there.

18:40 - [Music]

19:06 - So this one here, this is a very nice pen and firmness.

19:11 - They're all a little bit very nice and firm.

19:15 - You can see, let's look at the weights here a second, 15.

19:18 - This one here, there is a half-pound

19:20 - between weights, so you're going to see one that

19:23 - appears to be a little bit bigger than the other one.

19:26 - You can probably pick it out. Real wide loin,

19:29 - fuller in the lower hindquarter. This one's a little

19:32 - bit narrow and loin. Not quite as wide as that

19:35 - other one and again, real wide again and not quite

19:37 - as full and that lower. When you start looking at

19:40 - consistency, we have two really developed ones and

19:43 - then ones just a tick behind the other one.

19:46 - Again, definitely showing some of the best meat qualities

19:49 - but just slightly off here a little bit. So we're going to put that one here.

19:55 - So let's do some judging here and do the comments.

20:06 - So for the parents, grandparents, friends,

20:10 - and family out in the crowd, we basically did our placement.

20:14 - So all the work was done for the kids before they came the show and now it's the

20:19 - work on the table that needs to be compared and

20:22 - that's really what my job is. So you don't realize

20:25 - how much work it gets to just to get to this point.

20:27 - So kudos to every kid to be able to be able

20:29 - to put meat pens on the table.

20:32 - It is a fun, rewarding project and I encourage every kid or youth

20:37 - or child for HFFA member to be able to do it.

20:40 - So we're going to start off here with this

20:48 - fifth place pen. It's a 10 number 11, 10 number

20:52 - 11. So we got two really nice animals in here

20:56 - and then we got one that's just a little bit,

20:58 - just a little bit of a tick behind the other ones.

21:02 - And when I say that we got very muscular smooth

21:06 - animals except there's one in here that's just

21:12 - slightly really rough over the spine, just not

21:15 - quite as full in that lower hindquarter.

21:17 - If we would have one other one that would look like these two,

21:21 - it would be well into the upper end of the class.

21:24 - So nice job. Keep at the good work. Definitely nice Californians.

21:34 - Pen number four. It's going to be a lot 12, pen 12, okay.

21:45 - Brundi origins.

21:54 - And when you pull this pen out, you're going to see that they're all very similar.

22:00 - They definitely have that meat quality, strong

22:02 - shoulders and mid sections, but they start

22:04 - feeling a little bit in that hindquarter and the

22:06 - lower hindquarter. I like to see a little bit more

22:08 - depth of that loin in the upper hindquarter.

22:11 - I like to see a little bit more consistency of that coat.

22:14 - So again, nice pen. They just keep on

22:17 - gradually improving and overall meat quality.

22:26 - Pen number three is going to be the silver foxes.

22:32 - I really do like this pen a lot. Obviously that's why it's in third place.

22:37 - If you want to talk about uniformity and balance,

22:40 - nice pen of balance, they are very consistent.

22:42 - Where they lose to the first and second place

22:45 - is firmness of flesh, overall width of the loin

22:48 - and depth of the loin as for uniformity, nice job. Well done. Congratulations.

22:56 - Second place. It's going to be a pen of New Zealand and there's two pens.

23:02 - Second place is actually going to be this pen

23:04 - right here, which is going to be pen number 15.

23:07 - And the biggest thing that I'll say about this pen is these are very firm and flesh.

23:12 - You have two that look very similar to one another,

23:16 - but the third one is what pulls this pen down.

23:20 - Strong and shoulders, this one's about a half pound difference in the other one.

23:25 - You can truly see that in the width of the loin.

23:27 - Very wide, a little bit narrower, real wide.

23:30 - It's also the fullness of that lower hindquarter.

23:32 - Really full, really full into that lower and into that flank.

23:35 - This one's just a little bit pinched

23:37 - in that lower hindquarter. I like to see a little

23:39 - bit more fullness. Good condition of coat. Just slightly, slightly soft in texture.

23:49 - And then our grand champion on our first place pen

23:51 - is going to be this pen right here, which is pen number 13.

23:54 - Congratulations.

24:01 - Might be slightly smaller than the second place

24:04 - pen, but when you really start comparing to

24:06 - uniformity, overall condition of flesh, strength

24:10 - of the shoulders, midsection and hindquarter,

24:13 - this is the trio that you want to look for.

24:16 - All equal in the shoulders, all equal in the midsection,

24:19 - really good width. We're talking probably about

24:21 - three and a half, four inches of width to them,

24:23 - and you're actually talking about an inch of

24:26 - depth to that loin. Carry is all the way down to

24:28 - that lower hindquarter. They are all nicely

24:30 - filled into that lower hindquarter. They're firm.

24:33 - They feel like a mini brick, and their

24:35 - condition of coat is great texture and density.

24:38 - So well done. Congratulations. Grand champion meat pen right here.

24:46 - So please grand champion and the reserve

24:49 - champion, please stay upright for banners and pictures.

25:00 - Okay. Congratulations. Well done. Nicely done.

25:28 - [Music]