The Breckinridge County 4-H Livestock Club takes field trips every year as part of their educational experience. Not too far across the river, in Dubois County, Indiana, resides Purdue University's second larges Purdue Agricultural Center, with 1,320 acres near the beautiful Patoka Lake Reservoir. Roughly 530 acres are pastureland, while the other 630 acres are managed woodlands. SIPAC is a forage-based operation with research based on hair sheep, meat goats, and beef cattle management, forage production, grazing trials, and aquaculture. Breckinridge County and Hancock County 4-H members and volunteers took a day long field trip to the Southern Indiana Purdue Agriculture Center, where they visited the Heeke Animal Disease Diagnostic Lab and the SIPAC Farm.

First, they arrived at the Heeke Animal Disease Diagnostic Laboratory, where they were greeted by Dr. Grant Burcham, Veterinary Diagnostician. The Heeke Animal Disease Diagnostic Laboratory  helps veterinarians, animal health officials, animal producers and owners protect the health of the animal population by providing diagnoses of animal diseases. Dr. Burcham gave the 4-H group a tour of the facility, had everyone practice safe biosecurity, and performed two necropsies, where the 4-H members gloved up and were able to become hands on through the process.

Next, the Superintendent of the Southern Indiana Purdue Agricultural Center, Jason Tower, took the group on a tour of the beautiful farm. To prepare for the next hands on lesson, Mr. Tower penned goats on a feed pad, where the 4-H participants could collect fecal samples. After they group returned back from lunch, we took the fecal specimens to the teaching lab, where Anna Denny, the 4-H Extension Agent from Breckinridge County, Kentucky, taught them how to perform a Fecal Egg Count using the Modified McMaster Method.