Capturing a moment on the farm leads to contest win

Published 2:52 pm Tuesday, July 28, 2026

KAHOKA — University of Missouri Extension field specialist in 4-H youth development Katie Hogan always encourages youth and families to take plenty of photos of what they do on the farm.

Taking her own advice led to honorable mention recognition in this year’s Focus on Missouri Agriculture Photo Contest.

“Whether they win an award or not, it’s capturing those moments,” said Hogan, who serves Clark, Knox, Lewis, and Scotland counties in northeast Missouri. “Those moments don’t come back around.”

Hogan’s photo, titled “Supper Time,” shows four nursing piglets from the second litter born this year on the family farm near Kahoka.

“My daughter Maggie won an award at the local county fair that provided funds toward purchase of a breeding female with the expectation she will breed that animal and bring the progeny back to the county fair,” Hogan said.

“We went from just getting a couple of market hogs to keeping back a gilt, buying another gilt, buying a boar, and we actually bred.”

That second litter, born during a storm to a nervous first-time mom, kept Hogan, her husband Eric, and his dad busy the first week putting the piglets on to nurse every two or three hours and taking them off the mom for their safety.

“That group of pigs are still on our farm in the process of being finished,” Hogan said. “Some people don’t like the way animals are raised. These animals are raised better than a lot of humans. They get spoiled.”

Hogan snapped the photo with her cell phone not long after the mom took the piglets back full-time, and “being able to see them feeding and being successful, that was the moment for me that ‘OK, they’re going to make it. We’re making progress in this,’” she said.

“Most people see that picture and see four piglets there. When I see that picture, those are four piglets that without our intervention would not still be here,” she said. “She took them back, raised them up, and my daughter showed one of those gilts in the picture at the county fair.”

Capturing that moment for her family led to a “pretty cool” photo, one Hogan decided to enter in the Missouri Department of Agriculture’s 17th annual contest. Hogan knew about the contest thanks to her younger sister, who had entered and won in the past.
“Once again, this year’s Focus on Missouri Agriculture Photo Contest entries tell the story of Missouri’s dedicated and hard-working farmers,” Director of Agriculture Chris Chinn said in a news release.

Entries in five categories — Beauty of the Farm, Faces of the Farmer, Around the Barnyard, Everyday Life, and Kid’s Corner for youth ages 12 and under — were judged on visual impact, creativity, memorable content, and image quality, with winning photos displayed in the Agriculture Building at the Missouri State Fair, slated for Aug. 13 to 23 in Sedalia.

More than 700 photos were entered in the contest, with 22, including Hogan’s in the Around the Barnyard category for farm animals, named winners by a panel of judges from the agriculture industry.

“For us it’s kind of cool somebody else saw that image, not even knowing the story behind it and why it was so meaningful for us, and thought it captured something that really helped to tell a tale of Missouri ag,” Hogan said.

“Telling the stories with our photos and letting people see what they may not be able to experience helps them be better educated consumers, and then they become better educated voters. The more we can help folks understand how those food products are being bred and born and raised and ending up on their plate, the more informed they can be to make the best decisions.”

Winning photos are available to view on the department’s Flickr account online at flickr.com/photos/moagriculture/albums/72177720334797566/.