4-H’ers Rohan and Moira Springer are excited for this year’s Allen County Fair, and plan on submitting quite a few entries.
Rohan said, “I like 4-H, because I get to be competitive. And there are a couple people I like to compete with.”
According to Moira, “I really like 4-H because I get to try new things.”
Rohan likewise added that “I usually try to get ‘most projects’ overall, but this year I really procrastinated.”
AS FOR some specific projects, this year Rohan built a rocket that’s about 3 feet tall, which he described as “really exciting,” and he observed that “with a different engine, it can reach about 1600 feet.”
“I just shot off my rocket, but I still have to paint it,” he said of his “Magician”-style aircraft.
Rohan also plans to compete in categories such as buymanship, gardening and cooking.
Regarding her own projects, Moira made a sleek white dress for the clothing competition.
“It was fairly easy,” she said, “but it took a little bit of time.”
Moira is also trying her hand at painting this year, and said that “one is a cactus painting of a heart that’s a cactus.”
Unable to pick just one favorite activity, “I like them all,” she said of her projects.
WHEN IT comes to livestock, Rohan and Moira both have several animal friends, including pigs, goats, chickens, ducks, rabbits, a dog and a horse.
“I really like the chicken part,” Rohan said, “and have a rooster named Phoenix.”
“He is actually a Phoenix rooster, so if I fed him a special diet, his tail could grow up to 14 feet.”
“My sister thinks my rooster is pure evil,” he added with a grin.
“He attacks me, my mom, my brother, everybody,” Moira observed, simultaneously laughing while exasperated.
Rohan also enjoys his Dutch rabbit, Tulip, that he described as having “fly-back fur,” which according to him, means, “if you put it one way, it goes back the other.”
He’s likewise excited about his goat, which he said he “thinks will be able to show well.”
“A goat loves you, and will do almost anything for you,” he contended. “A pig, you have to work up the respect and love from it.”
Perhaps it helps, though, that, as he put it, “my goat has really bonded with me, because of early feeding.”
REGARDING her own animals, Moira said, “I have a rabbit named Fluffy, and he’s very fluffy. He’s a mini-rex bunny.”
Rexes are known, apparently, for their velvety fur, which this writer can attest is indeed delightfully soft.
“This is our first year with rabbits so we don’t know much,” Moira noted.
However, she recently learned that “they can stand on two feet. They don’t use anything else but their two back paws.”
WHEREAS Rohan has a penchant for goats, Moira has one for pigs.
“My goat is Gussy. We give him grass and grain,” she said. “Both our goats act like dogs.”
“But my pig loves me. … I think I’m going to do really well with my pig,” who, by the way, is named Josephine.
Moira is likewise in the process of learning how to show horses, and is working with her aunt’s 25-year-old pony, Butter, in preparation.
“It’s a miniature Shetland pony,” Moira explained excitedly.
Thus, thanks to Butter, along with all their other entries, the Springers are looking forward to an eventful time at the fairgrounds this year.
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