When I was about 6 years old, my family moved from our house in Emmitsburg, Maryland to a 40 some acre farm (Fox Meadow Farm) in a town that, before the move, I had never even heard of… and it was only a few miles up the road.
We moved to Rocky Ridge, Maryland. A town that is basically in the middle of nowhere, but surprisingly close to civilization. I’m not exactly sure what the population is… but I guess they don’t bother to count because it’s technically not even a town. We don’t have a mayor, or town commissioners, a school, or anything like that. But we do have a pretty sweet Volunteer Fire Company. I think our town was basically founded by them. They have 2 locations, a hall where they have their banquet and hold bingo’s and dinners and such, and then across the road is where the fire trucks are. We actually have a ‘carnival’ every year, if you can call it that. It is 4 days long at the park (Our town is only known for the big slide at the park that you go down on on blankets) and there is home cooked food, live music, a cake auction, and a few carnival games like fish toss and soda toss. There is also a parade every year on the Friday night of the carnival.
But, enough about the town, it’s not all that great. If you can even call it a ‘town’. I go to school in Thurmont, the town south of us. Now that is a legit town. Still a very, very small town, but a town nonetheless. It has a mayor and such, and a main street, so you know its real. It’s also on the map (yay!). I attend Catoctin High School, where I am currently a Junior. We have just barely 1000 students and we are the smallest in our county. While most other high schools in our county have gangs, we have the FFA. You cannot walk through our school without seeing one FFA sweatshirt or t-shirt. I do believe that half of the students are members, and while we are one of the smallest schools, we have the largest FFA chapter in MD. Go Catoctin FFA! I am proud to be the current Secretary of our chapter as well.
I started showing cattle when I was 8 years old in 4-H. I belong to the Rocky Ridge Progressive 4-H Club (Yeah, we have one…and it’s the largest in the county!). I started out my first year with an Angus steer and a Braunvieh steer (you will learn about those eventually..) and their names were Wilson & Spud. I then started showing through the National Junior Angus Association (NJAA) when I turned 9 and became a member of the Maryland Junior Angus Association (MJAA). I loved it so much because the shows were big, and I got to travel…I LOVE to travel. Which is one reason which provoked this blog…
FINALLY!
Alright, I’m done blabbing. I started this blog because over the years, as I travel more and more, and see more and more cattle, farms, and ranches, I've always wondered what they’d think of some little 40 acre farm over on the east coast, where we’ve got crabs (be mature). Actually, I don’t even live on the eastern shore where they’re all at. So for me, my state is pretty boring and insignificant. But I figured I’d blog about my families’ adventures on our small farm. My family can be pretty entertaining at times by the way we work together. It’s actually the way we don’t work together that’s funny.
I hope you enjoy my blog and read it every now and then to see what raising cattle is like here in little ol’ Maryland.
-T-
