Paul Szmal: And welcome back to FLX Morning here on Finger Lakes Newsradio, where you're sitting at 57 under clear skies for the moment. I'd like to welcome in Mo Tidball from Ontario County's Cornell Cooperative Extension Arm. Mo, good morning. How are you?
Mo Tidball: Good morning, Paul. Doing great. Nice weather.
Paul Szmal: Yes, and a busy time of year for you because you're just coming off of the Ontario County Fair here recently, and now you're getting ready for the New York State Fair. The New York State Fair is going on and lots of 4-H kids that showed their animals at the county fair or had art exhibits or even did a produced in New York State competition are now at the state fair getting ready to show their 4-H goods there. Now is that free for them to enter into the state fair or do they need to qualify having maybe one ribbon at a county fair? How does that whole system work?
Mo Tidball: You got it. They actually have to go through the county fair and get a ribbon and an evaluation and then some of them are chosen to go on to the state fair and they bring their items there and they do get a parking pass and a ticket and they get to get in there and have their If it's artwork, it's displayed in the 4-H hall, exhibit hall, and obviously the animals are in the various barns where they are supposed to be, such as the horse barn or the hog barn or the cattle barn.
Paul Szmal: I got to imagine that's pretty neat for a 4-H member to go to the state fair. They get a chance to network with other people of a similar age doing similar things.
Mo Tidball: It's an amazing experience, yep. My girls were lucky to do it through the Seneca County 4-H system and made various produced New York items. They had a great time. It's a lot of fun. And for the whole public. I mean, it's a great time to get out and go see the state fair and see what the kids are up to and all the other stuff going on there.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, and that's something you might miss. People go to the fair, they go for rides, they go for food, and they go for the vendors and go into the buildings and everything, but yeah, take a few minutes and check out the 4-H displays.
Mo Tidball: Absolutely. And there's also the dairy bar, and our ag and economic development specialist is there with a workforce development, so he's helping kids learn how to sort of run a dairy bar. And so they're serving milk and all different flavors, and you can go and get some nice New York state milk there.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, and they always like to say that the milk is the cheapest beverage you can buy at the state fair. That's correct. What is it, just 25 cents a cup?
Mo Tidball: I think it still is, yes.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, I'm surprised the price hasn't gone up with the cost of everything going up, but the fact that it's still inexpensive to get a cold glass of regular milk or chocolate milk or whatever you happen to be into, that's a pretty neat deal.
Mo Tidball: It is. They actually, I think they have mint milk there as well, so there's a lot of difference.
Paul Szmal: I've never heard of mint milk. That's different.
Mo Tidball: Yeah, yeah, it is. You know what? I'm going to head to the fair, I think, this weekend, so maybe I'll be brave and I'll try the mint milk.
Paul Szmal: There you go. All right. Go find Jacob. He'll hook you up.
Mo Tidball: Yeah, there you go. There you go. Now, what happens for the 4-H kids after the state fair?
Paul Szmal: After the state fair, they probably get to relax a little bit, get back going into school, but the 4-H year starts October 1st, and so they'll be back with their clubs and getting ready for planning out what they'd like to do for this coming 4-H year. In between that, there is a fall festival that is happening over at Camp Bristol Hills, right?
Mo Tidball: Yes. Camp Bristol Hills turns 100 years old this year, 100 years of 4-H camp in Ontario County. Not necessarily at the Bristol Hills location, but it's been probably a good 80 years there, and so we're doing lots of fun celebrations at camp this year for that. There's a 5K run that morning of September 13th, and you can register for that on our website, and then people can stay after that right for our fall festival, which starts right after that from 10 to 1 p.m., and it's kind of an open house for all of Cooperative Extension in Ontario County, so the master gardeners will be there doing a program, and we'll have our food expert there talking about canning, and we'll have lots of 4-H activities, and some of the 4-H kids will have their animals there for a little show-and-tell petting zoo type thing. We'll have some food and refreshments, and it's a beautiful time of year to be in 4-H Camp Bristol Hills, and the leaves will probably start to be turning a little bit, and it's free to the public for the fall festival event. The 5K is a fundraiser for our new pool complex, so if people like to run for a good charitable cause, I highly recommend the 5K. It's a fun 5K, and it's cross-country, so you can walk it, you can stroll it, you can run it however you prefer, and then the fall festival is free to the public.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, and as you said, this is a great way to kind of expose yourself to all of the various services and presentations that Ontario County Cornell Cooperative Extension has to offer.
Mo Tidball: Exactly, and we'll have, you know, lots of fun activity stations. It's just a great time for families and adults alike to just come out and do something different and learn a bit more about what Extension has to offer.
Paul Szmal: Well, what do you find is the particular favourite when you do a fall festival like this? What usually generates the most attention?
Mo Tidball: Well, last year we did pumpkin carving, which was really popular. We're not quite sure we're going to have the big carving pumpkins quite ready to harvest yet, so not sure about that one, but we have the master gardeners. People love to talk to the master gardeners about their gardening questions or even, you know, maybe their leaves on their trees are changing or doing something different, and they can get some expert advice from the master gardeners about that. Last year we had a butter making station, which was a lot of fun. 4-H had a robotics station, so there's really something for everyone coming out to see what's going on. And I'd be remiss if I didn't mention we also have a canning tomato sauce workshop coming up this weekend. I think there's still a few spots left for Saturday, so anybody who, you know, loves their local tomatoes and maybe is growing them or wants to get them from the farmer's market and isn't quite sure how to preserve sauce for the winter other than freezing, we'll be showing people how to safely can it.
Paul Szmal: Oh, that sounds like a good plan.
Mo Tidball: Yeah, it's great. It's only $10. So we'll come on and can some spaghetti scotch.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, absolutely. That can come in certainly handy. Sometimes it's easier to can it than it is to freeze it because you run out of room in the freezer with everything else that's in there.
Mo Tidball: Exactly, exactly. So we'll be covering pressure canning, which you need to do if you have meat in your sauce, and then just hot water bath canning if you don't have a pressure canner, which has different ingredients that are safe for that.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, I'm glad to see that canning is not becoming a lost art.
Mo Tidball: No, in fact, there's actually a resurgence in it. I think people want to know what's in their food. The local food stuff is something we talk about all the time. So people like to buy local food or grow their own food. And it's a great way to put up food for the winter like we always have.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, it's a great way to be able to do the farm to table thing on a home level.
Mo Tidball: Absolutely. Yes. Yep, yep. I just canned some beets the other day and I'm ready for those in the winter.
Paul Szmal: So when the 4-H season, 4-H year starts in the month of October, what are some of the first activities the kids are going to be doing?
Mo Tidball: Well, it depends on the different clubs. So in Ontario County, we have lots of different clubs. There's a dog obedience club, so people working with their dogs and a trainer comes in for different workshops for that. The livestock kids that did the livestock auction will already be sort of getting ready for that, gearing up and choosing their animals that they might want to show next year or thinking about that. We have a hens and hares club, so they're probably working on getting their hens and hares ready for the winter and all sorts of different activities.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, the cycle of choosing an animal and taking care of the animal and then perhaps showing the animal at the fair, that is a pretty involved process.
Mo Tidball: It is. So those youth take really good care of those animals to get them ready for the livestock auction. It's impressive. They did really well this year at the livestock auction. It was great to see.
Paul Szmal: Congratulations to them.
Mo Tidball: Absolutely. All right. Mo, thanks so much. The tomato canning course, you mentioned that there are a few slots open. How do people get in on those few slots that are available?
Paul Szmal: Yes, absolutely. They just need to go to Cooperative Extension's website, which is cceontario.org.
Mo Tidball: Okay. cceontario.org is the website, and that canning class is coming up this weekend, right?
Paul Szmal: It is. It's Saturday. So, yep, it is time to register because I think there's just a few spots left. So if anyone's interested, do sign up, and it's going to be a lot of fun. Emma Moore, our master food preserver, will be leading the class.
Mo Tidball: Fantastic. And Mo, always a pleasure to talk to you. Thank you so much for joining us this morning. We'll check in with you next month.
Paul Szmal: Sounds great. Have a good rest of your summer, Paul.
Mo Tidball: Yep, you too. It is 825 at FLX Morning.
