4-H: Offers Youngsters So Much

“The 4-H program did so much for my son. It was a fabulous growth experience for him,” says one proud mother.

Nancy Roberts of Nathrop, CO says that she signed up her son Jeffrey as a member of the 4-H Cloverbud program designed for youths from five through seven years of age. She’s been active ever since as a parent and volunteer leader. As a youngster, she never was a 4-H member even though her family always had pet dogs, horses, and cattle.

“4-H is a great way for youngsters to excel in something,” Roberts says. Jeffrey had a strong interest in entomology and over the years expanded his interests to showing dogs, cows, and chickens, she adds.

Roberts believes that 4-H taught Jeffrey responsibility, leadership, and patience. Her son held various positions in the local 4-H chapter, including president, vice president, and treasurer, and learned to speak, with confidence, in front of groups.

Jeffrey, who wants to become a surgeon, is a sophomore at Colorado State University. He probably will major in biology, his mother says.

October is the National 4-H club month. Currently, there are an estimated 90,000 4-H clubs across the country in cities and rural areas. For just a $35 fee, youths can join 4-H and participate in as many programs as they like. That’s a bargain, especially for youngsters wanting to learn how to train and show canines.

HISTORY OF 4-H

What does 4-H stand for? The short answer is Head, Heart, Hands, and Health. The organization’s pledge states: “I pledge my HEAD to clearer thinking, my HEART to greater loyalty, my HANDS to larger service, and my HEALTH to better living, for my club, my community, my country, and my world.”

Established in 1902 in Ohio, the organization was first called the Tomato Club or the Corn Growing Club. The concept spread to Minnesota and farther afield. In 1914, Congress passed an act that created the Cooperative Extension System within the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and “nationalized” 4-H. Thereafter, more clubs were formed and the clover emblem was adopted.

Today, the Cooperative Extension Service is part of USDA’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture, and partners with more than 100 land grant universities and over 3,000 county offices nationwide. In Colorado, Colorado State University’s Extension Service runs 4-H programs, and counties contribute some funding.

CANINE TRAINING

For nearly three years, Roberts has volunteered as the Paw Prints group leader of the local 4-H chapter and also serves as its dog training instructor. She wanted to give back to the organization that had helped her son so much and had experience training canines in obedience and agility.

In the summer, she conducts training classes twice a month for 4-H members and their dogs. The rest of the year, she tries to teach once a month but that schedule is subject to COVID 19 limitations.

Right now, she’s teaching agility, a sport enthusiastically embraced by the dogs and their young handlers, she says. So far, the youngsters have taught their wards to run through a tunnel, climb an A-frame, jump through a tire, and sail over a jump. After just one session, Roberts adds, the dogs mastered those exercises! Over the winter, she expects to move her classes inside and will teach junior showmanship and obedience.

Agility is just what Lily Egbert,11, of Salida, CO wants to learn with her mixed breed canine named Max “because he’s so coordinated,” she notes. The sixth-grader competed this summer at the county fair in both junior showmanship and obedience. Earlier this year, she began training her six or seven-year-old rescue dog that’s been her family’s canine for the last five years. She also shows chickens. Her dad says that Jeffrey, Roberts’ son, has been very helpful in teaching her to show the fowl.

Lily Sparks, just 8 of Salida, CO, also competed at the county fair with Little Blue, an energetic dog that came to live with her family when he was just eight weeks old. Lily’s mom said her daughter wanted to train Little Blue because she wanted to socialize him after he became a bit aggressive toward other dogs.

4-H OFFERINGS 

Both youngsters live in Chaffee County, which has an estimated population of 20,000. This year, about 110 to 120 children actively participate in 4-H and Cloverbuds, according to Morgan Young, 4-H Youth Development and Family Consumer Service agent for the county.

Young says Cloverbuds, which is open to children between five and seven years of age, is “a discovery program” and lets youngsters participate in many projects to determine their interests.

Youths between the ages of eight and eighteen may become 4-H members, she explains. Most of the 4-Hers in her county participate in the livestock division with their horses, steers, hogs, goats, dogs, and chickens. But she adds that many indoor activities teach skills, including those relating to woodworking, leather crafting, cake decorating, photography, and robotics.

Each summer, the county holds a fair. The grand champions and reserve grand champions of each activity go on to compete at the state fair. Currently, twenty-two adult volunteers, including Roberts, assist Young with the county program. But, she says, she’d love more adults, with specific expertise in some of the 4-H offerings, to teach the youngsters.

Young says the organization teaches much: recordkeeping, managing money, public speaking skills, and life skills, including nutrition, responsibility, persistence, and sportsmanship. If the member doesn’t complete his/her project in a year, they must wait a year before they can participate in that project again. This year, there are exceptions, thanks to COVID 19.

Young enjoyed 4-H so much as a youngster growing up in Grand Junction, CO that the 2019 West Texas A & M University graduate wanted a career in 4-H. She landed her current position about a year ago. “It’s my dream job,” she says, noting that she’s been involved in 4-H in various capacities since she was eight years old.

4-H SKILLS TRANSFER TO ADULT PURSUITS

Decades after her four-year stint in 4-H in rural Eads, CO, Franci Crowder of Buena Vista, CO became active in the American Kennel Club’s dog show world with her Norwegian Elkhound, Adele.

As a child, her family always had dogs as pets but she showed her family’s cattle. In the round-robin competition, which requires 4-Hers to show each other’s animals, she won reserve championship two years at the county level and competed at the state fair. “I had to know how to show not only cattle but horses, rabbits, hogs, etc. It was my favorite class,” she recalls fondly.

She also won a championship in the breeding program class on the county level by showing a bull, cow, and calf.

Crowder’s 4-H experiences taught her “at an early age, that each critter is different, with their own personality, and that they need patience. You have to stay with the training, with positive reinforcement.” She also acquired the skill to speak in public. Those lessons have remained with her, and she applied many of those skills as she trained and showed Adele to her American Kennel Club (AKC) conformation championship, and rally excellent, companion dog obedience, and barn hunt novice degrees as well as a Canine Good Citizen title.

She’s now working Adele, CH Greyplume’s Sage Advice, RE, BN, CD, RATN CGC, toward an agility degree and a more advanced barn hunt title. The lessons that she learned as a child showing cattle also helped her with her beloved rescue German Shephard Boo, who needed constant socialization with humans.

Adults and youth agree that the 4-H program offers much to youngsters.

Roberts would love more children to join her dog training classes and urges those interested to email her at nancyroberts1@aol.com.

She notes that 4-H dog training classes are geared toward teaching youngsters to train their canines while many dog performance sports classes are often more tailored toward adults and their dogs. That said, son Jeffrey not only trained his dogs at 4-H training classes but also practiced with a local dog training group comprised of adult handlers to polish his skills. And he had no trouble fitting in, Roberts says, thanks to life skills that 4-H taught him. Two years in a row, Jeffrey went on to place at the state fair in dog show competitions.

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