His first year in the Boer goat business turned out pretty well for 11-year-old Wacey Townsend.
Last week, the Sylvan Lake, Alta., youth was named rookie exhibitor of the year and also had the top selling animal at Canadian Western Agribition.
“I’m very happy with the sale and quite happy with the show,” said Townsend.
He started his business, Xplosion Goats, after a trip south of the border where he saw Show Wethers.
“I just thought they were the neatest thing,” he said. He bought two does and now has about 15 head.
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He showed and won at the Red Deer Westerner show this summer and at his 4-H Achievement Day.
At Agribition, his goats won several classes.
Xplosion Black Betty, a purebred doeling born June 6, sold for $875 to Ken Lischka of Venture 2 at Steelman, Sask., to top the sale.
Xplosion Capt. Jack Sparrow, a buck kid born June 11, earned the second highest price at $650. He sold to JE Ranch of Holdfast, Sask.
Townsend said the prices were about what he expected.
Lischka noted that many of the animals on offer failed to sell. He just returned from a visit to the Royal Agricultural Winter Fair in Toronto and said prices were better there for breeding animals.
“Meat prices are up but that’s not reflecting in the purebreds,” he said. “Our commercial people haven’t found the value of genetics.”
The champion market kid, weighing 61 pounds, sold for $2.10 per lb. Lischka said that’s getting closer to what the same animal would have earned in the East to reflect the value of its breeding.
Lischka said he was willing to pay the top price for Black Betty because she had a good pedigree.
