Stockyards Draw More than Buyers and Sellers

People in the audience raise their hands now and then to either chase away a buzzing fly or bid on livestock. A couple of people wipe their noses — but probably not to chase the strong scent of cattle. These men, dressed in broad-brimmed hats and cowboy boots, are used to such smells. They’re ranchers, some of them women and seniors, at a recent Wednesday auction at the Twin Falls Livestock Commission stockyards. The stockyards hold cattle auctions every Wednesday and small-animal auctions the first Saturday of each month. The sales always draw a crowd, but of two different groups, said office manager Sheila Smith: Ranchers come for the cattle, farmers for the other animals. And some come for neither buying nor selling. Mel Worthington, for instance, likes to listen to the auctioneers, see the animals or hang out with peers in the facility’s diner. “It’s something to do,” the Twin Falls man said on a recent Saturday.

Around him on the concrete benches sat other elderly farmers, some in conversation, others attentive to the movement of pigs and sheep through the arena. Joe Pavkov, 91, of Gooding was at the stockyards that Saturday with buddies Jerry Strickland, 70, John Etchart, 59, and Alan Romans, 52, all of Gooding. “It’s fun just getting together to visit with everyone,” Romans said. “To catch up with the gossip.” But times do change. “I used to know everybody here. Now I don’t know anybody,” Pavkov said. “That’s because you outlived them all,” Strickland said, his cowboy hat shaking with his chuckle...more