Washed, blow-dried and groomed, Dry Tip looks ready for a turn in the spotlight.
The dignified Hereford’s style is the product of William “Brad” Coch ran’s hard work in the year since he was a winner in the Catch-a-Calf contest at the 2015 National Western Stock Show.
“Cutting his hair is the worst. It takes eight hours to cut it all down, and two hours before the show to get him ready,” said Cochran, who cares for the animal at the U.S. Air Force Academy stables.
In just over 70 years, the has awarded nearly 3,000 steers to kids who are part of 4-H and Future Farmers of America.
Participants must catch and wrestle a calf to the ground, then drag it across a finish line.
Success brings the right to raise a steer that will be sold to market the following year at the stock show.
Cochran, who plans to be a heavy-equipment mechanic, will show the steer at this year’s event and receive 90 percent of the selling price.
The cattle are judged on their rate of weight gain and other qualities. Judges rate exhibitors on showmanship and their ability to keep growth and other records.
Sponsors donate money to pay for the animals, and the young people who raise them are responsible for the cost of feeding and caring for them.
Clancy Anderson, 24, was a Catch-a-Calf participant in 2009. Today, she is the stock show’s livestock coordinator.
Each month, she said, Catch-a-Calf winners must write a letter to their steer’s sponsor, a task that helps them develop communication and writing skills.
Participating in Catch-a-Calf put Anderson on the road to working at the National Western, she said. “I remember being at Catch-a-Calf and thinking I need to figure out a way to make this a full-time job.”
Anderson’s steer, Bo, earned her about $1,700 when he was sold in 2009.
She used the money for her college education, graduating from Oklahoma State, where she majored in agricultural communication.
Cochran lives with his family in a subdivision in Monument, where there is little room to raise cattle.
But Cochran’s father, William, is an Air Force pilot who taught at the academy before retiring recently.
Billy Jack Barrett, manager at the Air Force Academy Equestrian Center, agreed to have the steer raised at the stables.
Cochran volunteers at the stables, where a Warrior Wellness Program uses horses to help combat veterans cope with post-traumatic stress disorder and other conditions, said Barrett.
Catch-a-Calf and other 4-H type programs benefit the kids involved, he said.
“They are a lot better off taking care of livestock than going to the mall with their fancy phones,” he said.
Dry Tip has become well-known at the academy and in the surrounding area, said Tom Fey, who teaches Catch-a-Calf participants how to groom and train their steers.
“The family is retired from the Air Force, and they attend all the family activities at the academy,” Fey said.
The steer goes with Cochran, who also takes him to livestock shows and other events in the surrounding community.
“The steer has been to most every function at the academy and probably had more pictures taken than all (Catch-a-Calf) calves in history. Kids want to have their pictures taken with this steer,” Fey said.
Many of the young people who take part in Catch-a-Calf have never handled an animal the size of a steer, he said.
Though they might have experience with horses, sheep or other animals, a steer’s size makes it a challenge. “They don’t know how to handle that big animal,” Fey said. “I show them how to walk the animal, set the animal up for presentation to the judge. There is a lot of little nuances that showmen do to present their animal in the best way they can.”
Cochran’s steer weighs almost 1,200 pounds.
Cochran grew up around livestock, living on a 16-acre farm in Nebraska before moving to Colorado.
But Dry Tip is the first steer he has raised.
The animal was 861 pounds on the day Cochran got him.
Dry Tip has personality, he said. “He is like a big dog. I love him a lot, but at the end of the day, he does have to be sold as meat. That is the way I grew up,” he said.
For the young people raising them, especially those who haven’t grown up in a farm family, the final trip they make with the steer to a truck that will carry them to slaughter can be traumatic, Fey said.
“They can form a very strong bond, and there have been many times when I have walked back with a child and sat down on a bale of hay and talked to them while the tears rolled,” Fey said. “That is one of the differences of a farm, ranch kid from an urban kid. They know what the process is, but even some of those kids have difficulty because they have connected with this animal.”
Tom McGhee: 303-954-1671, tmcghee@denverpost.com or @dpmcghee
