The stars aligned at the National 4-H Dairy Cattle Judging Contest for Wisconsin's Jordan Seimers. With both a top placings award and a high reasons victory under his belt, Seimers' fate was sealed as the contest's top individual. Seimers not only saw the cows well yesterday, his reasons backed up his placings as he averaged 46.6 points and scored 716 overall. Seimers led the pack by far, 26 points ahead of the contest's second place individual, Lucas Moser of Michigan. Ella Jackson of Ohio claimed third place honors, breaking a tie for fourth with her reasons score. While each of these individuals claimed top honors, consistency was the key to earning a team victory. With their names called repeatedly throughout the evening, Ohio, Michigan and Wisconsin vied for the top team spot in 2014. And, much like last year, the contest came down to one point. With a score of 2043 and a 43.1 average, Michigan claimed victory. In second was Ohio with a score of 2042. Seimers' teammates also performed well, finishing third overall.
Three of Michigan's team members, Kayla Holsten, Lucas Moser and Bryce Frahm, spoke their way to the top, earning second, third and fifth place reasons honors overall. Michigan was also the contest's top reasons team. Suzanna Hall rounded out the team that was coached by Joe Domecq and Sarah Black. The group also took team Brown Swiss honors and was second in the Jersey breed, among other top five breed finishes.
While Ohio finished second as a team, the group was bolstered by Ella Jackson's third place finish overall. Jackson also finished third in the placings only category.
The author is an associate editor and an animal science graduate of Cornell University. Smith covers feeding, milk quality and heads up the World Dairy Expo Supplement. She grew up on a Medina, N.Y., dairy, and interned at a 1,700-cow western New York dairy, a large New York calf and heifer farm, and studied in New Zealand for one semester.
