Worry over bird flu prevents some states from allowing dairy cow showings; for other states, the fair goes on with testing

Fair competitor Emerson Wemark, 10, reclines with a cow.
(Photo by KC McGinnis, STAT)

For many farming families, more than a year of planning and work can go into having their farm animals compete at summer fairs. Adults and children look forward to getting their animals all gussied up and judged with excitement on par with a major holiday. But this year's showings are a bit different, with vets and animal farmers sharing concern over bird-flu, or H5N1, spreading from lactating cattle, reports Eric Boodman of STAT. Some states or counties have canceled their lactating dairy shows, but other fairs, like many in Iowa, will include lactating cattle showings with required testing as bird flu remains a worry and an annoyance.

The Iowa State Fair takes place in August, and its dairy shows might include hundreds of lactating cows "from a long list of dairies scattered across six different states," Boodman explains. "Just as authorities fretted about Christmas Covid spikes, so vets are trying to prevent trailers from clanking back home with microscopic stowaways replicating in udder cells."

Vets and animal farmers want to prevent H5N1 spread while still holding a binding community event that people have worked all year to enjoy. "They’re hoping to avert inter-species spread. Cow-to-chicken could wipe out a whole poultry flock. Cow-to-pig could put the virus into an efficient mutation machine," Boodman reports. "Though the handful of human infections documented so far in farmworkers have been mild, cow-to-human is a real risk, too. The longer H5N1 circulates in cattle, the more it poses a pandemic risk for us."

Michigan took the step of prohibiting all lactating dairy cow showings, but states such as Iowa, Wisconsin and Minnesota have taken a testing route, which allows lactating dairy cows to show, if they’re tested for Influenza A within the seven days before they arrive.

Earlier this month the Winneshiek County Fair in Iowa was held and despite testing regulations and some bird-flu anxiety, many families chose to participate. John and Peggy Sparrgrove along with the grandchildren opted to attend. Boodman writes, "These were the events their grandkids had spent all year working toward, and to them, the current threat didn’t justify scrapping the whole idea."

When it came to bird-flu opinions, Winneshiek dairy attendees offered varying degrees of skepticism and agreement. "A dairyman might give a reflexive eye roll about some rules, but also describe them as necessary; you can resent something that makes a tough business tougher and also see why it’s in place," Boodman reports. "One used the word 'propaganda,' then corrected himself, saying the virus is real and must be taken seriously."

Next pandemic could come from pigs at county or state fair

A researcher takes a 'snout out' sample at a fair.
(Photo by Maddie McGarvey, The New York Times)

A state or county fair can be all sorts of fun, but when there are pig shows, there's often swine flu, and the next pandemic could start there. "But there is real risk in our own backyards — and barnyards. Since 2011, there have been more confirmed human cases of swine flu in the United States than anywhere else in the world," reports Emily Anthes of The New York Times. "Outbreaks of zoonotic diseases, which can spread between animals and humans, have become more frequent in recent decades, and animal pathogens will continue spilling over into human populations in the years ahead. . . . Most have been linked to agricultural shows and fairs."

Americans often see pandemics as something that comes into the country and not something that happens here. But considering the number of swine cases in the U.S., the next pandemic could as easily come from within. "Although flu is often mild in pigs, the animals are renowned for giving rise to novel flu variants. In 2009, one of these new variants, which originated in pigs in Mexico, set off a pandemic that killed at least 150,000 people, according to estimates from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention," Anthes writes. "Dr. Andrew Bowman, a molecular epidemiologist at Ohio State University and his colleagues have been documenting the dangers and seeking ways to make swine shows safer. Meaningfully reducing the risks will require looking past the pigs to creatures on the other side of the spillover equation. What needs to change, Dr. Bowman said, 'is an awful lot of human behavior.'”

Anthes notes, "Pigs play a key role in the evolution of influenza. They can be infected by swine, bird and human flu viruses simultaneously, serving as mixing vessels in which different strains can reshuffle their genetic material, yielding new versions of the virus. When the 2009 swine flu pandemic hit, influenza surveillance in pigs was limited. [Bowman] began swabbing pigs at swine shows, ultimately uncovering a national network of events that resulted in human infections in a predictable annual cycle. Starting every spring, regional and national 'jackpot' shows, which attract serious swine competitors, bring together pigs from far-flung farms, causing new flu variants to spread across the country."

"Over the years that followed, the researchers worked to identify what made these shows risky. They found that although most fairs had hand-sanitation stations, few had signs explaining how to use them — and almost no one did," Anthes writes. Researchers also found that fair "line-ups" where pigs are one behind speeds transmission. "The researchers, who have shared their findings with show organizers and health officials, say they have seen some changes, with many shows moving away from mandatory mass weigh-in. . . . Still, some health recommendations, such as the advice to avoid eating or drinking around the animals, have been a tough sell. For many families, some of whom bring crockpots into the barn with them, sharing a meal at a show is a way of building community. . . . It is hard to determine how effective the team’s efforts have been overall; the surveillance is still fairly new, and some flu seasons are naturally worse than others." Bowman told Anthes: “But I think we have moved the needle. . . .There is change happening.”

Goat's 9-year-old keeper didn't want her slaughtered, so Mom saved the animal; then the law came with a warrant

Jessica Long’s 9-year-old daughter with her goat, Cedar.

(Photo courtesy of Advancing Law for Animals)

A mother saved her daughter's goat, sold at auction, from the slaughterhouse. County-fair officials took offense and sent detectives to apprehend it.

"Thus began the legal saga of Cedar the goat, a 7-month-old white Boer goat with chocolate markings framing its face who is now the subject of a federal civil rights lawsuit naming Shasta sheriff's officials, Shasta County, the Shasta District Fair and other defendants who are accused of involvement in the apparent slaughter of Cedar for a community barbecue," reports Sam Stanton of The Sacramento Bee. 

"Every day for three months, Jessica Long's young daughter walked and fed her goat. . . But when it was time for Cedar to be sold and slaughtered at the Shasta District Fair last year, the 9-year-old just couldn't go through with it," Stanton reports. "The animals are then entered in an auction to be sold and slaughtered for meat in hopes of teaching children about the work and care needed to raise livestock and provide food."

Once Long realized her daughter was not ready to part with her goat, she "decided to break the rules and take the goat that night and deal with the consequences later," reports Salvador Hernandez of the Los Angeles Times. Long wrote Shasta District Fair Chief Executive Melanie Silva, offering to reimburse the buyer the winning $902 bid and saying, "Our daughter lost three grandparents within the last year. . . . I couldn't bear the thought of the following weeks of sadness after the slaughter of her first livestock animal." Silva replied, "Making an exception for you will only teach [our] youth that they do not have to abide by the rules. . . . This has been a negative experience for the fairgrounds as this has been all over Facebook and Instagram."

When Long did not return Cedar, B.J. Macfarlane, livestock manager for the Shasta Fair Association, called the cops. "Armed with a search warrant, detectives drove more than 500 miles across Northern California in search of the goat," Stanton writes. "Echoing language used when law enforcement searches a home for drugs, the warrant allowed deputies to 'utilize breaching equipment to force open doorway(s), entry doors, exit doors, and locked containers' and to search all rooms. . . . any kind large enough to accommodate a small goat'." 

Cedar was found, "taken and slaughtered," Hernandez reports. Long's suit claims fair officials and the county "committed an 'egregious waste of police resources' and violated her and her daughter's Fourth Amendment and 14th Amendment rights protecting them from unreasonable searches and seizures, and due process. Long and her attorneys allege the dispute was a civil matter she was willing to resolve."

Officials declined to comment. Ryan Gordon, an attorney with Advancing Law for Animals, told Hernandez, "A child can't be held to the same standard as an adult can. When she wanted out, she had an absolute right. . . . It's shocking. It's a little girl's goat, not Pablo Escobar."

Pandemic threatens county fairs; most ineligible for aid

The pandemic has disrupted life in uncountable ways; county fairs are one. "Without the annual events, vendors, hotels and other small local businesses miss out on income they rely on. School-age children who spent the past year raising a pig or cow have no place to show or sell their work," April Simpson reports for Stateline. Many state fairs have also been canceled.

This year's cancellations or attendance limitations could put some county fairs' future in question. "Some fair operators fear for their fair's long-term survival, as many organizations are shut out of federal pandemic relief and receive little to no state money," Simpson reports.

Fairs generate about $4.7 billion annually, including money made on the fairgrounds for non-fair events such as RV shows, Simpson reports. Some fairs were able to get federal Paycheck Protection Program funds, but others were ineligible because they're quasi-governmental organizations or the wrong type of nonprofit. Only one-third of International Association of Fairs and Expositions members are eligible for federal aid. About 17 states provide some kind of financial aid to county fairs, often by subsidizing prizes for agricultural and other contests.

"A bill in the U.S. House, introduced by U.S. Rep. Josh Harder, a California Democrat, seeks $5 billion to create a new emergency grant program to help offset state and local fair losses," Simpson reports. "States would be able to apply for aid directly through the U.S. Department of Agriculture and then distribute it to fairs."

County fairs have been a linchpin of rural life. "Predating the founding of the United States, fairs began as markets designed to sell products. In the early 19th century, agricultural fairs became events for farm families to gather and share methods for improving crops and livestock," Simpson reports. "With educational and child labor policy changes, and other social shifts, fairs gradually became venues for agriculture education as more farmers in the 20th century went to college." Fairs also often serve as a platform for politicians to roll up their sleeves, glad-hand and give speeches.

In a nation with an increasing rural-urban cultural divide, county fairs help educate city dwellers about rural life. But more than that, "they’re celebrations of community where church dinners and stock car races provide opportunities to bump into friends and neighbors," Simpson reports. "Although the number of farmers has declined and fewer young people are choosing agriculture as a career, experts say fairs have become increasingly important."

Rural New York county fair refuses to ban Confederate flags; cites contractual obligations

While some state and local governments have taken down Confederate flags in light of the June shooting deaths of nine Africans Americans in a historic Charleston church, officials in Delaware County, New York, (Family Search map) say they have no intention of banning such merchandise at the county fair, set to run from Aug. 17-22, Robert Cairns reports for Watershed.

After the New York State Fair issued a Confederate flag ban, Leslie Kauffman, a 4-H club leader and a co-superintendent of the rabbit barn at the Delaware County Fair, asked the Delaware Valley Agricultural Society, which governs the local fair, to pass a similar ban locally.

Board members declined the request, saying vendors had already signed contracts with the fair and it was too late to make changes, Cairns writes. When asked about Confederate flags during the meeting, board member Norm Kilpatrick said, “The more of them, the better," and board director Niles Wilson said, “It's just part of history . . . It's none of our damn business.”

After the Watershed story was published, the Delaware Valley Agricultural Society on Thursday issued a statement: "We are concerned regarding recent articles that have appeared in the press relative to Confederate flags being permitted at this year’s Delaware County Fair. While we strongly believe some of our director’s comments regarding the issue were taken completely out of context, the fair board wants to clarify that vendor contracts for this year’s fair were finalized and signed several months ago. With this being said, we simply cannot ban the flags; however, this does not mean we condone them, either. The public should be aware that we are sensitive to their concerns and will be closely reviewing our policies regarding this topic for the 2016 Fair Season."

County fairs are struggling to get funds from urban legislators; some fairs are forced to cancel

County fairs are facing a crisis and getting little support from urban politicians. "The number of U.S. farms has dropped six straight years, and with them demand for entertainments that convened growers who spend much of the year in their fields," Elizabeth Campbell reports for Bloomberg. "With state budgets under pressure and industrial agriculture helping to drain the countryside’s population, urban legislators face tough choices. Illinois cut support for county fairs by 38 percent as attendance fell by almost a third from 2000 to 2013."

As a results, events like the Macon County Fair, which has been a staple in central Illinois for 158 years, was canceled and replaced with a scaled-down festival, Campbell writes. "Rural and small-town America face a 'growing demographic challenge,' according to a November 2013 report by the U.S. Agriculture Department’s Economic Research Service. Macon County hasn’t been spared. Its population fell 1.3 percent from April 2010 to July 2013, while the state’s grew 0.4 percent." (Campbell photo: Ride at the Macon County fairgrounds)

Funding for Illinois’s 104 county fairs has fallen from $8.16 million in 2000 to $5.07 million in 2013, Campbell writes. Similar numbers have been reported in other states. Dominic Vivona Jr., a controller at Amusements of America, a carnival operator based in Florence, S.C., that serves 30 to 40 fairs a year, told Campbell, “It’s definitely not atypical. It’s a common occurrence throughout the country.” (Read more)

Big-city writer spends summer traveling through rural heartland, finds many exotic wonders

Seth Kugel

UPDATE Sept. 6: "When I announced my 'through the heartland' road trip, over 1,000 readers wrote in with tips in the comments section, on Facebook and Twitter and via e-mail. I used as many of your recommendations as possible — but hundreds of good ideas inevitably went unused. That has left me with a choice: share the best with you, or keep them to myself as a personal reserve of story ideas that could last me for years and make my job exceedingly easy," Kugel writes. He decided to share a few more stories about his trip. To read more about Kugel's adventures click here.

Though he writes the Frugal Traveler feature for The New York Times, self-described city slicker Seth Kugel admits that before this summer he knew little about American life outside the big city, So, he decided to spend five weeks this summer traveling from Baton Rouge, La., to Fargo, N.D., visiting 10 states to see what the heart if rural America is all about. What he found is that the South and the Midwest heartland have plenty of exciting and interesting wonders to offer any traveler.

"I’ve made my way through Latin America, the Mediterranean, Scandinavia and southern China," Kugel writes. "But a spin through the middle of my own country was every bit as, well, exotic — revealing you don’t have to go abroad to experience new music, annual rites and political views far different from what you find at home."

Kugel, who went to Louisiana, Arkansas, Tennessee, Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, Iowa, South Dakota, Minnesota and North Dakota, visited county fairs, museums, national landmarks, the Ozarks, farmers' markets, mom-and-pop stores and restaurants, and off-the-beaten path local establishments. He met Native Americans, farmers, immigrants, and many locals who offered interesting conversation and opinions about everything from politics to immigration. He learned that even though New York is culturally diverse, so is the rest of the country, if yoy just scratch the surface. Mostly he learned that "America far from New York City is a strange and exotic place indeed." (Read more)

During his trip Kugel wrote an introduction, and stories about Louisiana, Memphis, the Ozarks, Kansas, Iowa, South Dakota, and Minnesota. (Kugel photo: A tractor motors through downtown Pella, Iowa, population 10,000)

State and county fairs succeed in hard times by expanding repertoire of events

In trying times, think different. That's what people in the state and county fair business have been doing this summer, writes Kirsti Marohn of USA Today. They're doing that by adding unique events to attract new visitors and offering low-cost entertainment to families on a budget. It seems that more people are forgoing vacations and looking for things to do closer to home, says Marla Calico, director of education for the International Association of Fairs and Expositions, which has 1,100 members in the U.S., Canada and several other countries. "What we have seen is in difficult economic times, fairs actually thrive," Calico says. (Newborn calf photo from Indiana Dairy Council)

Fair organizers have continued to work, reports Marohn, to honor agricultural roots but added non-farm events such as rocket launches and three-on-three basketball tournaments in Indiana's Elkhart County, marketing manager Kristy Ambrosen says. "It's not necessarily that you have to be a farm kid to enjoy it," she says. There, the 4-H Fair, a nine-day event in July, attracted nearly 245,000 people — up 4 percent from 2011. There, visitors could also watch exciting farm happenings like calves being born or watch chefs from popular local restaurants demonstrate how to prepare dishes using garden produce. "We always have it in our mind that there are a large portion of fair guests that are coming in the gate that are not regularly exposed to agriculture," Ambrosen says. Other fairs around the country have tried salsa-making contests, wine gardens, strolling entertainers, even historic villages, where volunteers dress up in period costumes and cook traditional foods. (Read more)

CDC warns of 12 new cases of swine flu, 10 linked to swine exposure at county fair in southwest Ohio

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention officials in Atlanta say 29 human cases of the new strain of the H3N2 swine flu have been confirmed in the last year, including 12 last week. Ten of the new cases were linked to the Butler County Fair in southwest Ohio, which ended last weekend. The county is just north of Cincinnati. None of the cases have been tied to human-to-human transmission, and all 12 of the new patients had close contact with swine before getting sick. The two other new cases occurred in Hawaii and Indiana. (CBS News photo)

Health officials told CBS that those attending state and county fairs should avoid taking food and drinks into barns, and should wash their hands after they have been near animals. Pregnant women, young children, the elderly and people with weakened immune systems are especially at risk for developing the flu strain.  So far, the strain hasn't spread easily, and recent cases have been mild. (Read more)

Being deep-fried at a fair takes on new meaning in drought and heat wave

In much of rural America, it's that most wonderful time of year -- fair season. A time when country life is on proud display, where generations of farm families gather and deep-fried foods seem guiltless. But at many county and state fairs this year, the most widespread drought since the 1950s is also evident, reports Monica Davey of The New York Times. (Keeping cool at the Ozaukee County Fair in Wisconsin was a full-time job; NYT photo by Darren Hauck)

“You see the stress of this all on individuals everywhere you go, even the fair,” said Vivian Hallett, who most years has entries (and winners) in nearly every imaginable plant category at the Coles County Fair in Illinois. Not this year. “We just didn’t have the stuff,” said Hallett, 65. “All our pumpkins have died. Zucchinis? Dead. Our green beans are just sitting there turning rubbery. And my gladiolas never came up at all.”

Bad, yes, but human attendance has shriveled, to -- the combination, organizers say, of miserably hot weather and larger, overwhelming concerns back home on the farms. “It was the roughest I’ve seen,” said Gary Shemanski, facilities manager at the Johnson County Fair in Iowa. There, he told Davey, attendance fell, four rabbits perished in heat that exceeded 100 degrees, and a beloved, final fireworks display was canceled for fear of setting off a blaze in the bone-dry county.

Why go at all? Because, organizers say, rural families may need a distraction more than ever. “The fair is just in your blood — you don’t think about it, you just go,” said Jean Klug, 63, of Cedarburg, Iowa. “It’s just country living,” said Bob Hartwig, who added that his children had intended to bring five cows to Wisconsin's Ozaukee County Fair but downsized to three just as his family was weighing downsizing a larger herd at home. Fair organizers say they are bracing for the possibility of still more fallout next year, writes Davey, when raising an extra pig for a fair may become an impossible luxury. “They may decide feed prices are just too high the next time,” said Brian Bolan, agriculture director for the Wisconsin State Fair.  (Read more)

Volunteers at your county fair deserve recognition

All over rural America this summer, thousands of community-minded volunteers are braving record heat, thunderstorms and the inevitable hassles of a county fair to make theirs a success. Every fair has one or more volunteers who really make that happen, and they deserve recognition in the local news media and beyond.

My favorite fair volunteer is my wife, Patti Cross, and she is the subject of a very nice feature story by Kristina Betsworth and photos by Tricia Spaulding in today's edition of The State Journal in Frankfort, Ky., in the wake of last week's Franklin County Fair. Since this item is personal, and the point of it is to encourage other papers to follow suit, I'll limit our excerpt to the last three paragraphs of the story:

In the end, Patti says all of her hard work pays off.

“All it takes is one or two little faces beaming after they have won a competition or ridden a midway ride or had their first funnel cake or seen their first sheep,” she said.

“The enjoyment of the community is what it is all about.”

The State Journal's site is subscriber-only, but if you want a copy of the story e-mail me.

Horse breeders' incentives will exclude those who intentionally injure Tennessee Walking Horses

Breeders who intentionally injure their Tennessee Walking Horses will no longer be eligible for benefits from the Kentucky Walking Horse Association's breeders incentive fund. The Kentucky Horse Racing Commission's new standards seek to eliminate the practice of "soaring," intentionally injuring a horse to exaggerate its showy gait, reports Janet Patton of the Lexington Herald-Leader.

The new guidelines will allow the fund, suspended since February, to be reinstated, but also call for inspectors from one of three anti-soaring activist groups to be used in determining eligible recipients. The Herald-Leader and state investigations discovered that despite assurances from Earl Rogers, head of the KWHA incentive fund, a dozen fund recipients had been cited for violations of the federal Horse Protection Act in 2008. Rogers would not comment to Patton about the new regulations.

Donna Bennefield, administrative director of the Horse Protection Council, told Patton, "I think this is going to be a huge, huge incentive to fix a very long problem." Kentucky Horse Racing Commissioner Ned Bonnie said, "It [new rules] puts Kentucky in the leadership position with respect to how you treat horses." (Read more)

Seeking cheaper thrills, more folks frequent fairs

The start of summer means there will be a county fair going on somewhere near you for the next several weeks. And you might find more people there than usual because they're looking for less expensive entertainment, Hugo Martin reports for the Los Angeles Times in the paper's "Snapshots of the Recession" series. (Times photo by Myung Chun)

"County fair and livestock show operators across the country have reported strong attendance numbers this spring and early this summer," Martin writes. "Why? Experts suggest that in tough economic times, Americans turn to county fairs for nearby, inexpensive, convenient and family-friendly entertainment."

"When we go through difficult times, we stay close to what we know and what we love," Marla Calico, a spokeswoman for the International Association of Fairs and Expositions, which represents about 1,300 fairs worldwide, told Martin. (Read more)

Only half of country-music fans have Internet at home, so are beyond much industry marketing

A recent survey for the Country Music Association found that only 50 percent of country music fans have Internet access at home – a fact that has left both executives and artists disheartened at the loss of marketing potential, The Washington Post reports.

Younger artists like Taylor Swift maintain a heavy online presence, from MySpace to Facebook, to an official domain through their respective record companies. Some groups, like Lady Antebellum, “owes its very existence to the Internet,” Melinda Newman writes. Even after the band was picked up by a production company, almost a third of their first album sales were digital. Older artists too, are being pushed by producers to expand their online use and fan base.

Reba McEntire (signing autographs in photo by Billy Kingsley of The Tennessean) now blogs and is on Twitter, and recently moved her bimonthly newsletter, which used to be mailed to more than 50,000 fans, onto her Web site.

Despite the love of the music, nearly 42 percent of fans were not interested in trying to obtain Internet access. One, Chuck Taulbee, lives in Stockton, Mo., where broadband is not available. As for his options, "It's dial-up, and it's just too expensive,” he says. The high costs of dial up, as well as concerns about online content, are why most fans remain uninterested, Newman reports. Of particular concern to CMA is that “countryphiles,” who are “more likely to be female than male, between the ages of 25 and 39, married, white and from small towns” drive almost half of all country music revenue, and they can’t be reached with Internet. (Read more)

After complaints from atheists, Tenn. county fair says they can get 'God and Country Day' discount

The Wilson County Fair in Tennessee has agreed to extend its "God and Country Day" discount to atheists after they complained, reports J.R. Lind of the Lebanon Democrat.

"God and Country Day, by tradition the first Sunday of the fair, is designed to honor military veterans, while at the same time giving a $2 discount to fairgoers who bring a church bulletin to the James E. Ward Agricultural Center," Lind writes for the daily paper. "Wilson County Promotions, which runs the fair, is non-governmental, though the Ag Center is owned by Wilson County government. The fair catalog entry for God and Country Day does not mention Christianity and specifically notes that the bulletin must be "from the weekend" of God and Country Day, ostensibly allowing anyone who attended a religious service between Friday and Sunday the opportunity to get the discount."

The complaint came from American Atheists Inc., which contended the discount was unconstitutional and discriminatory. Its press release said members of its group and others would bring printouts of their Web sites to qualify for the discount, and Wilson County Promotions said it would honor them, Lind reports. (Read more)

Wilson County, which borders Nashville, has long been in transition from rural to suburban, and its residents are now more the latter than the former. Its estimated population in 2006 was about 104,000, and the average commuting time of its residents was 27.5 minutes; the national average was 25 minutes. Local officials and developers have proposed it as the site for a Bible theme park; here's a story from Clay Carey of The Tennessean. Here is Lind's latest report on the proposal.

UPDATE, Aug. 16: The Democrat really covers the fair and horse show, expected to draw 400,000. Read about vendors. New this year: FairCam (source of photo).

UPDATE, Aug. 20: Lind reports, "Sunday, around 30 atheists and other non-theists came to the James E. Ward Agriculture Center and were admitted, along with churchgoers, at the lower price. Many of the atheists wore t-shirts saying they supported 'Foxhole Atheists,' a project that provides care packages for servicemembers who do not believe in God. Likewise, many churchgoers wore t-shirts proclaiming their beliefs." (Read more)