How to Pick a Winner by Donna Minton Williams

Before you can show a winner, you have to know one when you see it.

Most people look at the hip first. It is the flashy part, and it is the wrong place to start. Good cattle people start at the ground, read the animal in the same order every time, and never talk themselves past bad feet.

This is that order, written down.

How to Pick a Winner walks you through evaluating show cattle the way a judge does. Structure and soundness first, because those are the faults you cannot fix. Then capacity, then muscle, then the genetics behind the animal. You will learn to read feet and legs, to see the difference between fat and real muscle shape, to read an EPD line and know what the percentiles are telling you, and to rank traits differently for a heifer than for a steer, because the animal's job sets the priority.

Inside:

Four chapters on foundation, composition, genetics, and breed specifics, covering Limousin, Maine-Anjou, Red Angus, Simmental, Shorthorn, Angus, and club calves

How to read a sale catalog and a pen card

Judge a Class With Me, a step-by-step walk through placing a class and giving your reasons

How to answer a judge, and how to take a critique

A selection checklist you can run on any animal

Ten common selection mistakes, so you do not learn them the hard way

A glossary of judging terms

Insight from nine judges, including Charlie Boyd II, Mark Hoge, Brandon Callis, Matt Leo, Dave Allan, Alan Miller, John H. Pfeiffer Jr., Bodee Schlipf, and Kyle Colyer

Donna's Advice throughout, which is what she actually looks for when she is buying

Written for the junior exhibitor, the parent writing the check, and the ag teacher trying to explain it to twenty kids at once. Donna Minton Williams has spent forty-two years in agriculture and runs a registered multi-breed show cattle operation and youth program in LaRue, Texas.

Part of the 5 Daughters Ranch Clinic Series. Building character through agriculture.