August 20, 2025 • 9 mins
On this edition of ACF 411, Russ talks to Brody about being fair royalty last year, showing his swine and rabbits and his future plans!
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
And we are back to another edition of ACF for one.
Speaker 2 (00:03):
One, the official podcast of the Allen County Fair powered
by Nutrient. I'm Rush Decker, your host, and we have
an old familiar, old familiar face.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
Brody. How you doing, man good?
Speaker 3 (00:14):
I'm good.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
Yeah. So is this your final Allen County Fair?
Speaker 3 (00:18):
Yes, it is.
Speaker 1 (00:19):
So last year you had a crown.
Speaker 3 (00:21):
Yeah, thanks to you.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
Tell us tell us, So, so what why did you
have a crown last year?
Speaker 4 (00:28):
Actually last year on the podcast, I decided I wouldn't
say really throw a fuss about it, but we made it,
made a joke that Delaney had a.
Speaker 3 (00:37):
Crown and I did it.
Speaker 4 (00:39):
And so at our with what was the breakfast we had?
Speaker 1 (00:44):
Yeah, we were.
Speaker 4 (00:45):
We were at breakfast and I did a I had
to do a little speech for basically just telling people
the importance of helping and volunteering and kind of contributing
to our livestock auction we have. And right after that,
or right before that, I can't remember what it was,
you presented me with what I believe was actually a
Burger king crowd.
Speaker 3 (01:05):
It was with a Nutrient logo on it.
Speaker 1 (01:07):
Yeah, we put the Nutrient logo over the Burger King log.
That's how we did that. Yep, So that was that
was yeah, because we made it.
Speaker 2 (01:15):
We were having fun all week about the queen gets
a crown and the king gets a.
Speaker 1 (01:20):
Ball cap, and we thought it seems like an inequity. Yeah,
we resolved it.
Speaker 3 (01:26):
Yeah, I guess.
Speaker 4 (01:26):
So.
Speaker 1 (01:27):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:27):
So your final Allen County Fair as an exhibitor, yes,
and you've got swine and rabbits.
Speaker 3 (01:34):
Yep.
Speaker 1 (01:34):
Let's talk about the rabbits first. What kind of rabbits
you got?
Speaker 3 (01:37):
So, I've taken many different breeds of rabbits.
Speaker 4 (01:42):
I actually when I first started, we took a little
breed called Champagne de Argents and they are.
Speaker 3 (01:48):
Very very rare around this part of the country.
Speaker 4 (01:52):
Some places will have a lot of them, like they
do have their national shows like all the other breeds do.
Speaker 3 (01:56):
But they're definitely not as big as some of your
other breeds.
Speaker 4 (01:59):
And and we kind of got into those because my
grandpa when my mom was younger, that's what he read
for my mom to take to fair when she was
about my age, and he just that's what we got
back into when we started, and now I'm taking I
took White New Zealand's for a breeding project, and we
still have those at home, but we're just mainly using
(02:21):
those now as market rabbits, and we breed those to
have our market pens on our single friars for our shows.
But my breeding sock this year for fair was I
had a junior buck Mini Rex and a senior dough
Flemish Giant.
Speaker 1 (02:35):
And how'd you do?
Speaker 4 (02:37):
I did very well with the market point of it,
but not so well with the breeding part. I actually
had I believe it was fourth overall single friar, and
then I had reserve Grand Champion market pen, and then
the other day I had Grand Champion board and raised
friar and reserve Grand Champion board and raised market pen.
Speaker 1 (02:56):
So as a rabbit expert, I wouldn't go that far.
Speaker 2 (02:59):
So as a rabbit an expert, does it really taste
like chicken?
Speaker 3 (03:02):
Oh yeah, if you would.
Speaker 4 (03:04):
If you would set a plate down in front of
somebody and put a blindfold on them and have rabbit
and chicken cook the exact same way, I can guarantee
you they would not be able to tell a difference.
Speaker 1 (03:14):
So that's true.
Speaker 3 (03:15):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (03:15):
I always thought it was just a punchline, but.
Speaker 3 (03:17):
Oh no, I can attest to it.
Speaker 4 (03:19):
We We've had it for many family meals just because
we have access amount of rabbits on the barn and
they're just good freezer fillers. But people are always afraid
to eat them because they're as people would say, they're
so cute and totally but they.
Speaker 1 (03:33):
Taste good cool. Have they ever bitten you?
Speaker 3 (03:36):
Yeah? Oh yeah many times.
Speaker 4 (03:38):
We Actually, I guess you could say it's hereditary, but
some rabbits will actually get what we call cage dominance
to the point where they do tend to get a
little hostile if you go to stick your hands in
the cage to like get them out for when you
have to clean or anything like that.
Speaker 3 (03:54):
But they do tend to get a little dominant.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
Really, we did not know that, all right, So let's
switch gar let's move from the rabbit up to the hogs.
Speaker 1 (04:02):
Yeah, yeah, what you got? What do you got this year?
Speaker 4 (04:04):
So this year I took a crossbread market gilt, a
crossbread market barrow, and I took a purebread dr rock guilt,
and I actually brought two of them home.
Speaker 3 (04:14):
And my goal here.
Speaker 4 (04:16):
Is actually to begin to breed them, because we used
to do that for a while, but we got out
of it when our sole got too old, so I
kind of want to pick back up in it, just
because I'm not really ready to give up the fair life.
Speaker 1 (04:28):
All right, So how'd you do in judging?
Speaker 4 (04:32):
It was a little rockier this year than what we've
had in the past. We did a lot better than
we thought we were going to. We came in, our
hogs were weighing a lot lighter than what we normally
have them. We had feed struggles all year long, and
I guess with I had the sixth overall dur rock
in the show.
Speaker 3 (04:51):
I didn't end up placing with my guilt.
Speaker 4 (04:53):
My crossbread guilt, and I won my class for my
cross bread.
Speaker 3 (05:00):
Barrow, but I didn't end up polating in the final drive.
Speaker 1 (05:02):
All right.
Speaker 2 (05:03):
All right, so let's talk about what's life like after
the fair?
Speaker 1 (05:09):
For Brodie. I know you're going to school, right.
Speaker 4 (05:11):
Yeah, yeah, So I'm actually going into my sophomore year
at the Ohio State University of Lima, and I am
majoring in animal science because my end goal is actually
to become a large animal vet because we really don't
have anything like that around here, and I want to
bring something more local to kind of help out our
community because I understand the struggles myself of not having
(05:35):
that sort of like I guess you could say, not
having that help closer to you when you really need
it in times of emergencies.
Speaker 2 (05:44):
Yeah, So where's the nearest so you know, you're a
hog person, if if you have a sick hog, where's
the closest large animal vet k uh No.
Speaker 3 (05:55):
Actually, so the one that we use, which.
Speaker 4 (05:57):
Is in our opinion, the most reliable ever had issues
with it, and people always say that they've had good
experiences with them. Is Doc Price up in Upper Sandusky.
Speaker 2 (06:07):
Upper Sandusky, so Wine Dot County. Yes, so that's a
that's a little hall to get you here.
Speaker 4 (06:12):
Yeah, I mean and when you really think about it, say,
in our aspect breeding, when you go from you get
your hog in the ferrying crate and she goes into
labor and say she's having trouble, you know, passing hogs,
you have to load her up for a c section,
and by the time you get her out of the crate,
load her into the trailer drive all the way to
(06:33):
Upper Sandusky, you have the risk losing not only your sow,
but also the piglets as well.
Speaker 1 (06:38):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (06:38):
So there was actually just an article on the High
State Alumni magazine that talked about the shortage of large
animal vets and one of the things I guess that
added to that.
Speaker 1 (06:49):
Shortage was the pandemic.
Speaker 2 (06:51):
Yeah, because they said during the pandemic, a lot of
people decided they were home alone, so they got a
cat or a dog, yeah, as a companion, And so
a big market was created for small animal vetn aarians.
So the new vets coming out of school decided, well,
there's already made job for me, already made practice because
(07:11):
there are all these dogs and cats and maybe opted
to go small when they might have gone large animal.
And so hince for where we are today. So yeah,
kudos in good luck on going to vet school.
Speaker 3 (07:23):
Thank you, thank you.
Speaker 1 (07:24):
That would be great.
Speaker 2 (07:25):
Oh yeah, so we've talked about this before, but I
think it's a great story. Your most embarrassing moment. You've
had a long career at the Allen County Fair. What's
your most embarrassing moment here?
Speaker 4 (07:36):
Oh, there's there's definitely been a lot, to say the least.
I guess I really don't have a most embarrassing but
I have a few that kind of just made a
little I really wouldn't say embarrassed, but kind of just
nervous to like go out in front of a certain
crowd again.
Speaker 3 (07:54):
And I mean I've had whether.
Speaker 4 (07:56):
It was messing up a name on announcing for shows
and stuff, or I've definitely had a few incidents in
the hog Barn where I've went for a little bit
of a ride.
Speaker 1 (08:07):
I remember that.
Speaker 3 (08:08):
Yeah, backwards right, yes, yep.
Speaker 2 (08:10):
Tell us about that, about the backward ride on the
that's going to be exciting.
Speaker 4 (08:14):
Yeah, it definitely is, but you get that heart rush
and then you realize this is a little more scary
than exciting.
Speaker 1 (08:23):
So you're getting older, you're getting wiser.
Speaker 3 (08:25):
Yet trying to at least all right.
Speaker 2 (08:27):
So we've been We've been asking a lot of people
this this week. So as you walk around the Allen
County favor Besides all the great junior Fair projects, there
is a lot of great and unusual fair food available.
What is your absolute go to favorite fair food?
Speaker 4 (08:45):
So I really don't have a favorite fair food, but
I have a favorite fair drink. I guess you could say, Okay,
there's a very specific smoothie place right across from the
hog Barn that they do shaved ice as well, and
that has been a staple for me and my grandpa,
for I couldn't even tell you how long he got
(09:07):
me into it one time, and we I to be
honest with you, I'm not going to sugar good.
Speaker 3 (09:13):
I might have a little bit of an addiction.
Speaker 4 (09:16):
It's got a little steep over the years, and it's
gotten to the point where a couple of years we've.
Speaker 3 (09:21):
Went there so much, to the point where they've actually
sponsored me.
Speaker 1 (09:24):
Really.
Speaker 4 (09:24):
Yeah, so I've gotten a fair vendor to sponsor me
because we've been there so much.
Speaker 1 (09:29):
Yeah, I'd say, you must be a pretty regular guest work.
Speaker 4 (09:31):
I mean I go up there and they don't even
have to ask me what I want. I just start
talking to him as if it's a regular day and
hand them my money and they make it and we
just chat.
Speaker 2 (09:43):
Cool Brody always could catching up with you man, Yeah,
you as well.
Speaker 1 (09:46):
All right, have a good time and we're going to
see everybody else around the Allen County Fair
And we are back to another edition of ACF for one.
Speaker 2 (00:03):
One, the official podcast of the Allen County Fair powered
by Nutrient. I'm Rush Decker, your host, and we have
an old familiar, old familiar face.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
Brody. How you doing, man good?
Speaker 3 (00:14):
I'm good.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
Yeah. So is this your final Allen County Fair?
Speaker 3 (00:18):
Yes, it is.
Speaker 1 (00:19):
So last year you had a crown.
Speaker 3 (00:21):
Yeah, thanks to you.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
Tell us tell us, So, so what why did you
have a crown last year?
Speaker 4 (00:28):
Actually last year on the podcast, I decided I wouldn't
say really throw a fuss about it, but we made it,
made a joke that Delaney had a.
Speaker 3 (00:37):
Crown and I did it.
Speaker 4 (00:39):
And so at our with what was the breakfast we had?
Speaker 1 (00:44):
Yeah, we were.
Speaker 4 (00:45):
We were at breakfast and I did a I had
to do a little speech for basically just telling people
the importance of helping and volunteering and kind of contributing
to our livestock auction we have. And right after that,
or right before that, I can't remember what it was,
you presented me with what I believe was actually a
Burger king crowd.
Speaker 3 (01:05):
It was with a Nutrient logo on it.
Speaker 1 (01:07):
Yeah, we put the Nutrient logo over the Burger King log.
That's how we did that. Yep, So that was that
was yeah, because we made it.
Speaker 2 (01:15):
We were having fun all week about the queen gets
a crown and the king gets a.
Speaker 1 (01:20):
Ball cap, and we thought it seems like an inequity. Yeah,
we resolved it.
Speaker 3 (01:26):
Yeah, I guess.
Speaker 4 (01:26):
So.
Speaker 1 (01:27):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:27):
So your final Allen County Fair as an exhibitor, yes,
and you've got swine and rabbits.
Speaker 3 (01:34):
Yep.
Speaker 1 (01:34):
Let's talk about the rabbits first. What kind of rabbits
you got?
Speaker 3 (01:37):
So, I've taken many different breeds of rabbits.
Speaker 4 (01:42):
I actually when I first started, we took a little
breed called Champagne de Argents and they are.
Speaker 3 (01:48):
Very very rare around this part of the country.
Speaker 4 (01:52):
Some places will have a lot of them, like they
do have their national shows like all the other breeds do.
Speaker 3 (01:56):
But they're definitely not as big as some of your
other breeds.
Speaker 4 (01:59):
And and we kind of got into those because my
grandpa when my mom was younger, that's what he read
for my mom to take to fair when she was
about my age, and he just that's what we got
back into when we started, and now I'm taking I
took White New Zealand's for a breeding project, and we
still have those at home, but we're just mainly using
(02:21):
those now as market rabbits, and we breed those to
have our market pens on our single friars for our shows.
But my breeding sock this year for fair was I
had a junior buck Mini Rex and a senior dough
Flemish Giant.
Speaker 1 (02:35):
And how'd you do?
Speaker 4 (02:37):
I did very well with the market point of it,
but not so well with the breeding part. I actually
had I believe it was fourth overall single friar, and
then I had reserve Grand Champion market pen, and then
the other day I had Grand Champion board and raised
friar and reserve Grand Champion board and raised market pen.
Speaker 1 (02:56):
So as a rabbit expert, I wouldn't go that far.
Speaker 2 (02:59):
So as a rabbit an expert, does it really taste
like chicken?
Speaker 3 (03:02):
Oh yeah, if you would.
Speaker 4 (03:04):
If you would set a plate down in front of
somebody and put a blindfold on them and have rabbit
and chicken cook the exact same way, I can guarantee
you they would not be able to tell a difference.
Speaker 1 (03:14):
So that's true.
Speaker 3 (03:15):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (03:15):
I always thought it was just a punchline, but.
Speaker 3 (03:17):
Oh no, I can attest to it.
Speaker 4 (03:19):
We We've had it for many family meals just because
we have access amount of rabbits on the barn and
they're just good freezer fillers. But people are always afraid
to eat them because they're as people would say, they're
so cute and totally but they.
Speaker 1 (03:33):
Taste good cool. Have they ever bitten you?
Speaker 3 (03:36):
Yeah? Oh yeah many times.
Speaker 4 (03:38):
We Actually, I guess you could say it's hereditary, but
some rabbits will actually get what we call cage dominance
to the point where they do tend to get a
little hostile if you go to stick your hands in
the cage to like get them out for when you
have to clean or anything like that.
Speaker 3 (03:54):
But they do tend to get a little dominant.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
Really, we did not know that, all right, So let's
switch gar let's move from the rabbit up to the hogs.
Speaker 1 (04:02):
Yeah, yeah, what you got? What do you got this year?
Speaker 4 (04:04):
So this year I took a crossbread market gilt, a
crossbread market barrow, and I took a purebread dr rock guilt,
and I actually brought two of them home.
Speaker 3 (04:14):
And my goal here.
Speaker 4 (04:16):
Is actually to begin to breed them, because we used
to do that for a while, but we got out
of it when our sole got too old, so I
kind of want to pick back up in it, just
because I'm not really ready to give up the fair life.
Speaker 1 (04:28):
All right, So how'd you do in judging?
Speaker 4 (04:32):
It was a little rockier this year than what we've
had in the past. We did a lot better than
we thought we were going to. We came in, our
hogs were weighing a lot lighter than what we normally
have them. We had feed struggles all year long, and
I guess with I had the sixth overall dur rock
in the show.
Speaker 3 (04:51):
I didn't end up placing with my guilt.
Speaker 4 (04:53):
My crossbread guilt, and I won my class for my
cross bread.
Speaker 3 (05:00):
Barrow, but I didn't end up polating in the final drive.
Speaker 1 (05:02):
All right.
Speaker 2 (05:03):
All right, so let's talk about what's life like after
the fair?
Speaker 1 (05:09):
For Brodie. I know you're going to school, right.
Speaker 4 (05:11):
Yeah, yeah, So I'm actually going into my sophomore year
at the Ohio State University of Lima, and I am
majoring in animal science because my end goal is actually
to become a large animal vet because we really don't
have anything like that around here, and I want to
bring something more local to kind of help out our
community because I understand the struggles myself of not having
(05:35):
that sort of like I guess you could say, not
having that help closer to you when you really need
it in times of emergencies.
Speaker 2 (05:44):
Yeah, So where's the nearest so you know, you're a
hog person, if if you have a sick hog, where's
the closest large animal vet k uh No.
Speaker 3 (05:55):
Actually, so the one that we use, which.
Speaker 4 (05:57):
Is in our opinion, the most reliable ever had issues
with it, and people always say that they've had good
experiences with them. Is Doc Price up in Upper Sandusky.
Speaker 2 (06:07):
Upper Sandusky, so Wine Dot County. Yes, so that's a
that's a little hall to get you here.
Speaker 4 (06:12):
Yeah, I mean and when you really think about it, say,
in our aspect breeding, when you go from you get
your hog in the ferrying crate and she goes into
labor and say she's having trouble, you know, passing hogs,
you have to load her up for a c section,
and by the time you get her out of the crate,
load her into the trailer drive all the way to
(06:33):
Upper Sandusky, you have the risk losing not only your sow,
but also the piglets as well.
Speaker 1 (06:38):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (06:38):
So there was actually just an article on the High
State Alumni magazine that talked about the shortage of large
animal vets and one of the things I guess that
added to that.
Speaker 1 (06:49):
Shortage was the pandemic.
Speaker 2 (06:51):
Yeah, because they said during the pandemic, a lot of
people decided they were home alone, so they got a
cat or a dog, yeah, as a companion, And so
a big market was created for small animal vetn aarians.
So the new vets coming out of school decided, well,
there's already made job for me, already made practice because
(07:11):
there are all these dogs and cats and maybe opted
to go small when they might have gone large animal.
And so hince for where we are today. So yeah,
kudos in good luck on going to vet school.
Speaker 3 (07:23):
Thank you, thank you.
Speaker 1 (07:24):
That would be great.
Speaker 2 (07:25):
Oh yeah, so we've talked about this before, but I
think it's a great story. Your most embarrassing moment. You've
had a long career at the Allen County Fair. What's
your most embarrassing moment here?
Speaker 4 (07:36):
Oh, there's there's definitely been a lot, to say the least.
I guess I really don't have a most embarrassing but
I have a few that kind of just made a
little I really wouldn't say embarrassed, but kind of just
nervous to like go out in front of a certain
crowd again.
Speaker 3 (07:54):
And I mean I've had whether.
Speaker 4 (07:56):
It was messing up a name on announcing for shows
and stuff, or I've definitely had a few incidents in
the hog Barn where I've went for a little bit
of a ride.
Speaker 1 (08:07):
I remember that.
Speaker 3 (08:08):
Yeah, backwards right, yes, yep.
Speaker 2 (08:10):
Tell us about that, about the backward ride on the
that's going to be exciting.
Speaker 4 (08:14):
Yeah, it definitely is, but you get that heart rush
and then you realize this is a little more scary
than exciting.
Speaker 1 (08:23):
So you're getting older, you're getting wiser.
Speaker 3 (08:25):
Yet trying to at least all right.
Speaker 2 (08:27):
So we've been We've been asking a lot of people
this this week. So as you walk around the Allen
County favor Besides all the great junior Fair projects, there
is a lot of great and unusual fair food available.
What is your absolute go to favorite fair food?
Speaker 4 (08:45):
So I really don't have a favorite fair food, but
I have a favorite fair drink. I guess you could say, Okay,
there's a very specific smoothie place right across from the
hog Barn that they do shaved ice as well, and
that has been a staple for me and my grandpa,
for I couldn't even tell you how long he got
(09:07):
me into it one time, and we I to be
honest with you, I'm not going to sugar good.
Speaker 3 (09:13):
I might have a little bit of an addiction.
Speaker 4 (09:16):
It's got a little steep over the years, and it's
gotten to the point where a couple of years we've.
Speaker 3 (09:21):
Went there so much, to the point where they've actually
sponsored me.
Speaker 1 (09:24):
Really.
Speaker 4 (09:24):
Yeah, so I've gotten a fair vendor to sponsor me
because we've been there so much.
Speaker 1 (09:29):
Yeah, I'd say, you must be a pretty regular guest work.
Speaker 4 (09:31):
I mean I go up there and they don't even
have to ask me what I want. I just start
talking to him as if it's a regular day and
hand them my money and they make it and we
just chat.
Speaker 2 (09:43):
Cool Brody always could catching up with you man, Yeah,
you as well.
Speaker 1 (09:46):
All right, have a good time and we're going to
see everybody else around the Allen County Fair
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