You'll feel a little stick: Purdue University veterinarian student Clint Shireman of Wanatah administers medication to a cow as other Purdue veterinarian students look on Thursday, July 31 at the Indiana State Fairgrounds in Indianapolis. Staff photo by Joseph C. Garza
INDIANAPOLIS — When a pig named Bruce stumbled as it was unloaded off a trailer and into the swine barn at the Indiana State Fairgrounds Thursday morning, Clint Shireman took notice.
The Purdue University veterinary student spent the next half-hour with Bruce and its young owner, to check the 250-pound Berkshire hog to see if had slipped or was showing early signs of illness.
Before day’s end, Shireman and his supervisor could tell it was the former. Bruce, treated with some Vitamin B and a cold pack, was better and show-ready.
“I love kids who name their pigs,” Shireman said. “They’re kids who work hard and really want to be here.”
Had the diagnosis turned out differently, Bruce would have been sent packing.
Shireman is part of a team of animal health experts monitoring more than 12,000 creatures on exhibit at the Indiana State Fair. Shireman and Dr. Jim Weisman, a Purdue veterinarian who oversees the team, live in campers on the fairgrounds during the fair’s run. They’re on call 24/7 along with a team of vets and veterinary students.
Their duties include drug-testing champion animals for illegal growth- or performance-enhancing substances, and helping to implement a biosecurity plan designed to reduce the risk of infectious illness for animals and an estimated 900,000 humans who will attend the fair before it ends Aug. 17.
“Our main message is, ‘You’ve got to be healthy to come to the fair,” said Dr. Weisman. “That goes for humans as well as animals.”
State fairs are breeding grounds for viruses transmitted among animals, especially in livestock barns. Animals from farms around the state live in close quarters for days in summer-heated barns open to the curious public.
“We compare it to kindergarten,” said Denise Derrer, spokeswoman for the Indiana Board of Animal Health. “A lot of animals and people together for the first time, and they’re exposed to a lot of new bugs.”
It’s a worry for state fairs nationwide. The spread of the porcine epidemic diarrhea virus, which is fatal only to piglets, prompted the California and New York fairs to suspend sow and piglet exhibitions this year. West Virginia officials recommended all hogs go directly to slaughter following their fair to reduce the risk of pigs contracting the virus and taking it to piglets back home.
So far, the Indiana State Fair hasn’t taken such action. But fair officials, working with 4-H Club leaders, spent the summer urging animal exhibitors to take precautions at their county fairs. Protective measures ranged from animal vaccinations to practicing good animal and human hygiene.
Those efforts are carrying over to the State Fair, where the biosecurity effort ranges widely from special food-preparation rules for concessionaires to large signs reminding fair-goers to wash their hands frequently.
Animals that arrive at the State Fairgrounds are identified – many by electronic ear tags – then vetted by health experts. Every animal gets checked, from the chickens bound for the poultry barn to donkeys going to the petting zoo. On the afternoon before the fair opened, Weisman and an Indianapolis Zoo veterinarian looked over elephants brought in by the Carson & Barnes Circus.
Shireman was busy in the steer barn at the time, checking a calf with cough.
“I would have liked to examine an elephant,” he said. “I don’t know when I’ll get another chance to do that.”
Much of the responsibility for maintaining animal health falls to the young 4-H Club exhibitors, which Weisman said is intentional.
“Four-H is about education,” he said. “Teaching these kids how to be good stewards of their animals is an important part of that.”
It can be hard work. Matt, Megan, and Kayla Marion – siblings from Terre Haute – brought pigs and cows to the fair and are in the livestock barns by 6:30 a.m. every morning, while their animals are on exhibit, to feed and water them and to put down fresh bedding.
They’ll spend the days keeping the animals clean and hydrated, and cooled with electric fans and frequent washings. Their fair chores typically last until 11 p.m., when the barns close.
“We just want to keep them healthy,” said Matt, who heads to college soon with dreams of becoming a veterinarian.
That’s the big goal for all fair-goers, said Shireman, a former 4-H’er who started showing sheep when he was 4 years old.
“It’s the State Fair, so anything can happen,” he said. “Our job is to keep the bad things happening to a minimum.”
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