Reese Burdette was up at 5:30 Tuesday morning to get her cows ready for the 4-H Dairy Round-up at the Franklin County Fair.
“I am not a morning person. One day I slept til lunchtime,” the 10-year-old observed.
“She’s just a normal kid,” said her mother, Claire. “She doesn’t even know she has challenges.”
Three years ago over Memorial Day weekend, the Mercersburg youngster was seriously burned and suffered smoke inhalation in a house fire.
In July 2014, the dairy show at the Franklin County Fair was dedicated to Reese and her grandmother, Patricia Stiles, who also was injured in the fire. There was a moment of silence for positive thoughts and prayer dedicated to Reese when news struck that she wasn’t doing so well.
In March 2016, after 662 days at Johns Hopkins, Reese’s homecoming was greeted by cheering crowds lining the streets of Mercersburg. Two days earlier, her favorite cow, Pantene, gave birth to Pardi Gras, one of two cows she is showing this week at the fair.
“It’s great to be at the fair, seeing her interacting her friends,” Claire Burdette said. “It’s a great comparison from last year when she was in a wheel chair and on oxygen.”
“I like taking care of my cows and showing them,” Reese said as she smiled, bee-bopped around the barn and got ready to change into her white competition clothes. “I’m happy to be back here.”
Reese is a member of the Western 4-H Dairy Club, but members come from all over the county, according to Robert Eckstine, who leads the club with Jamie Hartman and Shani Ferguson.
Erika Cauffman, 19, lives in the Quincy area and joined the club last year. Her friend, Quinn Cashell, 24, has been involved with 4-H her whole life. Quinn knew Erika was interested in agriculture and thought 4-H would be a good fit.
Erika is majoring in ag business management at Penn State and plans to minor in agronomy. Her family owns farmland, but rents it to the neighboring farmer.
“I see cows every day,” said the 2016 graduate of Waynesboro Area Senior High School. The family of her boyfriend, Logan Moon, is involved in farming.
At the fair, she is showing her own cow, Jess, a red and white Holstein, and Fate, a black and white Holstein, on loan from Quinn.
The Greencastle-Antrim 4-H Dairy Club also has members beyond the geography of its name.
“We have herds from south of Waynesboro to Dry Run and Newburg and everywhere in between,” said Dr. Daniel Oliver, who leads the club with Lucy Crider and Emily Wingert.
Linda Steck was in the G-A barn with her grandchildren, Hallie and Gary Steck, on Tuesday. On Wednesday she will be in Hershey when their father, Mark, receives the award for South-Central Pennsylvania Conservation Farmer of the Year.
“I’m really proud of him. My husband died 21 years ago and Mark took over the farm at 19,” she said.
He earned the award last year at the county level for work done at the family’s Green Valley Farm in Dry Run, including the installation of a manure pit.
Dealing with manure is a big part of farming and Kaleb Keefer, 10, of Greencastle, said his brother, Brandon, 8, “likes taking poop to the manure spreader.”
Their parents, Melissa and Barron, own Valley View Farms near Greencastle, Kaleb is showing two cows, Jill and Leeza, but Brandon’s cow came down with pink eye and could not go to the fair.
Brandon said he is disappointed and Kaleb said, “My brother might show Jill in the open show (Thursday night).”
Source: The Record Herald
