- 1
- 2
- next
- | single page
|
Tessa and Paige Stahl, Somerset, hold the banner Paige won from her national champion pig in front of her prize trailer on the Stahl Potato Farm. (Staff photo by Alyssa Choiniere / October 28, 2012) |
A Somerset teen won a national title with her pig at the National Junior Swine Show in Hamburg, N.Y.
Paige Stahl, a 15-year-old sophomore at Somerset Area High School, won the 2012 Grand Champion Purebred Gilt Overall National Junior Swine Association Eastern Regional with her purebred Yorkshire gilt, Kinzy.
“It was a huge honor,” Stahl said. “I was speechless.”
Kinzy was selected as the champion Yorkshire in a previous show at Hamburg. From there, the two went on to compete for the grand champion title and won.
Winners in this category are sent out for breeding. They are selected based on structure, or overall appearance, soundness, or the ability to move fluidly, and good maternal characteristics, or possessing physical characteristics of a pig who can breed well and nurture healthy piglets.
Stahl won $1,000, a one-year trailer use with option to buy, and a title banner.
“I’m going to put the money into an account to buy new pigs for the following year for the fair,” she said.
The trailer will assist the family when traveling for shows. She and her sister Tessa, 12, show animals across four different states at seven shows every spring and summer.
Tessa Stahl also won awards at the show. She won sixth in class with her Yorkshire pig, Jiggly, and eighth in showmanship.
Parents Greta and Kermit Stahl also showed livestock as children and encouraged their daughters to get involved.
