SUSQUEHANNA COUNTY, Pa. — Summertime for kids in Susquehanna County who participate in 4-H means there's no time to kick back and relax.
They must spend their free time raising their animals, learning the responsibilities to take care of the livestock, and continuing the tradition of agriculture.
"Get up early and make sure that the animals get fed and watered. Then if it's not too hot by the time we're done with chores, they'll go for their morning walk, which is just down around the field. It's just a lot of effort but it's fun though," said 4-H member, Katelyn Supancik.
"All of the expenses come out of our pockets so our parents don't pay for our stuff," said 4-H member, Delaney Hollenbeck.
On July 7th, the Harford Fair Committee announced that they were going to cancel this year's fair, due to the concerns of keeping fair goers safe.
No fair means no livestock auction and that was bad news for 4-H kids, like the Supancik's who raise pigs for the auction.
"We put a lot of work into the fair and 4-H so it was very difficult when they decided that we couldn't have the fair this year," said Jamie Supancik of the Susqco Youth Ag Foundation.
Each kid puts everything into their animal, both physically and financially to make sure that they get top dollar for their animal.
But all hope wasn't lost.
Lopatofsky's Auction near Clifford stepped in and offered to do a virtual auction for any of the Susquehanna County 4-H members who wanted to sell their animals.
"Each animal will have a picture and a description so they can see who's selling it and the estimated weight and stuff like that and they can place their bids," continued Jamie.
Delaney Hollenbeck opted for a different route to sell her steer Baxter. She posted to Facebook all the information on purchasing the cow.
"I thought it'd be cool to sell him myself. Sell some locally grown beef to some local people, hopefully," said Delaney.
If you are interested in participating in the virtual auction on August 15th at 9 a.m., when you go to the Lopatofsky Auction website click on the proxibid link and sign up for online bidding and view all the kids' livestock projects.
If you want to make an offer on Baxter, follow this link to Delaney's Facebook page for the post on Baxter. Bidding for Baxter ends on August 8th.