TURTLE LAKE -The Dakota Feeder Calf Show has become a major fall festival for residents in and around this McLean County community.

"Last year, we had 250 at our pitchfork fondue and we're expecting more this year," Teresa Presser, one of the organizers.

On Saturday, participants can try their hand at cow-pie bingo and win $100 if all the numbers are sold and a selected steer "marks" a contestant's number from its pen.

Also scheduled are a craft fair with 60 tables, a horse-training seminar, photos with Miss Rodeo North Dakota, a border collie demonstration, a petting zoo and the pitchfork fondue.

The growth in the number of animals at the livestock show is keeping pace with the number of people, in part because of the North Dakota State University Research Center in Carrington, Presser said.

NDSU would like to get at least 170 animals for research in Carrington after the Turtle Lake show, she said.

"You can enter a pen of three or four steers," Presser said. "There's judging and a people's choice. They leave here and go to Carrington. They're fed there, which is kind of a test plot. When they get to their right weight, they are sent to a slaughterhouse."

Karl Hoppe and Vern Anderson oversee the Turtle Lake project. The two livestock specialists said the Dakota Feeder Calf Show was developed for cattle producers willing to consign calves to a show and feed contest. Calves are evaluated for conformity and uniformity.

At the Carrington feedlot, the animals are fed corn mixed with field peas, lentils and chickpeas. The steers later are given an 80 percent grain diet.

The calves are sorted into market groups based on back fat, marbling and live weight.

Hoppe and Anderson said 178 steers competed in the Turtle Lake show last year, and after the first group of 41 was slaughtered, 60 percent of the meat qualified as choice or better. Forty percent were considered select grade.

With top quality processing results and scientific data for producers, Presser said, the Dakota Feeder Calf Show should continue to grow.

"We had it the same weekend as the Hostfest," Presser said, referring to Minot's big Scandinavian festival. "But we changed it this year. That should help us."