Livestock trumps sports for Andy Sloan By Matt Reese
Some teenagers like videogames. Some like play- ing sports. Andy Sloan likes working with livestock.
It is not that Andy dislikes sports, but his dedi- cation to his first love overshadowed athletics. After all, football two-a-days are during the Ohio State Fair, basketball is going on during the late show season, and baseball is during the jackpot show circuit. There simply was not time for both, and working with livestock was the clear winner.
“I gave up sports for livestock. I’ve always been around livestock and I think showing livestock will help me more in the future than playing basketball or football,” Andy said. “And, you get to meet so many more people. My parents know a lot about livestock and we all work to- gether. Everybody pitches in — Mom and Dad, me, my brother Mike, and my sister Kara. I help out with a little of everything.”
Instead of playing on the athletic field, 18-year- old Andy plays an important role in his family’s business, Sloan Club Lambs, in Richland Coun- ty. His parents, Jim and Sara, started the busi- ness when Andy’s older sister, Kara, was in high school. It has expanded significantly in recent years with hard work from the whole family.
“It got started when my sister started FFA, which was six or eight years ago. We expanded the flock in the last three or four years to where we’ve really been pushing it,” Andy said. “Last year we had an online sale and we sold 25 in that. We took five to a sale in Eaton and sold some off the farm. We sold right around 60 lambs and that was our biggest year ever. They were sold all over the country. Once we got a good foundation in the flock, we started go- ing out every year or so to get some good new genetics to keep upgrading the flock. We raise pure Hamp and grades with Hamp crossed with Suffolks and other crossbreds.”
With a family so heavily involved with live- stock, at an early age Andy learned to love ani- mals, especially cattle and lambs.
“My siblings are both older than me, so I helped them out until I got to 4-H age,” he said.
Now that he is approaching the end of his time in 4-H, he still loves working with steers and mar-
16 2011 Spring Livestock Directory
Beef at the 2010 Ohio State Fair, which is one of his favorite accomplishments.
Andy had the Reserve Grand Champion Market
ket lambs from the barn to the show ring. With the lambs, Andy gets to work with most of his market projects from the second they are born.
“This year I am planning on showing two or three of my own, and we still go out and buy some,” he said. “It is nice because we can watch our lambs grow up and see what we did right and what we need to do differently with the ge- netic backgrounds.”
Andy carefully examines the lambs for the win- ning traits and starts preparing them for the show ring early on.
“You want lambs that are massive, structurally sound, pretty from the side, with a good-sized loin and big rack. You need to start early with feeding and exercise. We walk the lambs with halters quite a bit and we have a dirt hill in the pasture that they can play on to get their exer- cise,” he said. “We can give them anywhere from 2 pounds of feed a day on up to 4 or 5, but if you have one getting too big, you have to start managing him early. If you have to pull them back really hard before the show, it can give them a stale look. You want to glide them all the way through. You can pull 5 pounds off a lamb
A supplement to Ohio’s Country Journal
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