Notes for your April 4-H Club Meetings

Animal Nutrition Clinic

• At Murdoch’s in Missoula – This Wednesday, April 8^th, at 6pm, Purina feed reps will give a presentation on market animal nutrition, and will answer questions.

Drama Festival

• The 69^th Annual 4-H Drama Festival will be held Saturday, April 11^th, starting at 10am at the Potomac-Greenough Community Center in Potomac, MT.  So far, we have 3 clubs confirmed to do plays (Potomac, Mullan Trail and Bear Creek).

• Come watch (especially if your club is thinking about doing a play next year) and participate in the pie auction.  You’ll love it!

Montana 4-H Week of Service: April 12-19

• The Montana 4-H Ambassador Officer Team (2 of whom are Missoula 4-H members) challenge you to participate in the first annual Montana 4-H Week of Service. This is an initiative to encourage Montana 4-H youth to make a positive impact within their communities and share what they are doing.
  

• During the week of April 12-19, 2015, we encourage each county to join together and illustrate how BIG a difference Montana 4-H can make by participating in community service projects of their choice. These projects can be as simple as volunteering with a local organization or as extravagant as a full scale community-wide project.  For more information, click the image below:

Market Hog Tagging

• This will be done just like last year.  4:30pm-7pm at the Missoula Fairgrounds on Thursday, April 16^th.  Come in the South Ave entrance, and head for the infield of the race track.

• We will line up along that path (see image below – tagging will be where the star is, then we will exit over the track and out the road that goes by the YMCA and puts you out on Russell Street).

• We will have all the equipment and disinfectant, and will ask you to handle/tag your own hogs if possible, so we reduce the chance of potential disease spread from truck to truck. 

 (click to enlarge)

Quality Assurance Trainings

• The final QA Training will be this Friday, April 10^th, 6-8pm at the Extension Office.        

• Members who plan to sell a market animal at the 2015 Western Montana Fair need to be up-to-date on their QA Training.

• Members need to attend once as a Junior Member (age 8-13 on October 1^st, 2014) and once as a Senior Member (age 14+ on October 1, 2014).

Livestock Judging Contest

• Saturday, April 18^th, at the Ag Education Center starting with check-in at 8:30am.  Click the image below for a registration form online.

• Top Junior, Senior and FFA judge will receive a buckle, and the top Novice judge will receive an embroidered duffle bag.  Registration is $10 and includes lunch.

Senior 4-H Scholarships

• Graduating Senior 4-H members can apply for Missoula 4-H Scholarships.  Click the image below for an application online.

• They are due April 24^th, and interviews will be held May 5^th.

4-H Extravaganza

• This annual event, scheduled for May 7th, this year, has been held for decades – with support from the Chamber of Commerce’s Agri-Business Committee – who provides dinner for the event at no cost to 4-H.  Dinner starts at 5:30pm.  Workshops start at 6pm.

• Held at the MCPS Ag Education Center on South Avenue (just west of Big Sky HS), there is the opportunity for members to experience 3 or 4 workshops on a variety of topics (past workshops included Animal Nutrition, Showmanship for all livestock species, 4-H Records, Dance, Public Speaking, Horse Vet Basics, Roping, etc.).

• The 4-H Club with the most members present, as well as the Club with the highest percentage of members present, will receive $100 from the 4-H Council.  There will be door prizes as well.

4-H Ambassador Applications

• We select the 2015-16 Ambassador Team in May, and members serve through next July.

• Applications are due May 15^th, and interviews will be held May 27^th.  Click the image below for an application online.

Horse Project

• May 17^th – It’s been a few years, but we’re bringing back the “Mandatory May Clinic.”  Members who are new to 4-H Horse, older members who have a new project horse, older members who are starting in a new project area (i.e. Ranch Horse, Packing, Western Games), or members who want to skip a level (e.g. Western Horsemanship 2 to 4) should plan to attend.

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Montana 4-H Foundation $5.00 per Member Donation

• The 4-H Foundation requests every year that Counties make a $5 per member donation.  In addition to 4-H Scholarships, the Foundation contributes to many statewide 4-H events annually.  In recent years, Missoula 4-H has not been a consistent contributor to this effort.  The Missoula 4-H Council voted recently to turn to the 4-H Clubs to help meet this commitment.  Clubs could decide whether to charge a $5 per member fee, do a special fundraiser to cover the donation, or cover the donation through the fundraisers you already do. 

• The 4-H Ambassadors have been making the rounds speaking to 4-H Clubs about the benefits of contributing to the 4-H Foundation, and about opportunities available to 4-H members statewide.  If you would like the Ambassadors to visit your club, please contact Shana Duffalo.

• Checks should be made to the Montana 4-H Foundation, and sent to Colleen at the Missoula office and we will mail them all to Bozeman.  Contributions made by May 31^st will recognized at Montana 4-H Congress in July.  If you have questions, contact a 4-H Council Board member, or the Missoula Extension Office. 

4-H Calendar online

• If you don’t have it bookmarked, just Google “Missoula 4-H,” then click the 4-H Calendar of Events link on the bottom left of the 4-H page.

• All of these dates and many more are on the Missoula 4-H calendar online.  Click the image below to go to the Calendar, and you can click on any event for more information.

County-wide Project meetings

There are currently county-wide project meetings going on for the following projects.  Anyone enrolled (or interested in) the project can attend these meetings.

• Dog (8^th and 22^nd of April)
• Robotics (April dates not set yet)
• Poultry (3^rd Tuesday) 
• Meat Goat (3^rd Wednesday) 
• Horse (3^rd Thursday) 
• Rabbit (4^th Thursday)

County 4-H Committee meetings

These committees that plan events and discuss the rules and policies surrounding them meet monthly.  Anyone can attend these meetings.

• 4-H Council Board (1^st Wednesday, 6pm at the Extension Office)
• 4-H Shooting Sports Committee (1^st Thursday, 6pm at the Extension Office)
• 4-H Horse Committee (2^nd Wednesday, 7pm at the Extension Office)
• 4-H Livestock Committee (2^nd Thursday, 7pm at the Extension Office)