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Gustavus teen at fair carries on family tradition and ‘loves his cows’
By Ed Runyan
BAZETTA
The 26 dairy cattle entered in the Trumbull County Fair this year by Zac Logan and his family fill up more than half of a barn.
And those 26 are only a fraction of the 80 cattle the Logans raise at their farm in Gustavus Township.
Zac, 18, can tell you quite a bit about each of those 80 cows.
“I understand their temperament because I spend so much time with them,” he said this week while attending to his cows.
“I can tell you what their names are and what their pedigrees are, what their mother’s genetics are,” he said, nodding to cows on both sides of the barn.
“They have the same personality traits as humans. They can be great. And others, you don’t want to be around,” he said.
All year long, he feeds the cattle in the morning and “after school, I go straight to the farm to start my chores,” he said.
But it’s clear that cows and farm life are not just a chore.
“I love it,” he said, his face conveying as much as his words. “I wouldn’t change anything.”
The Logans have the largest number of cows on the fairgrounds, but Zac also enjoys traveling with them to a large number of significant other fairs across Ohio, Kentucky, Pennsylvania and New York.
“I love taking it to the next level,” he said. “I just work hard and see if it pays off. I put in a ton of hours in the off season. I spend more time with cows than anyone,” he said.
Zac, who will be a senior at Joseph Badger High School this fall, is a fourth-generation dairy farmer and fifth-generation farmer who plans to attend Ohio State University’s Agriculture Technical Institute and get a degree in dairy science and business.
He wants to continue on the family farm in Gustavus and with “genetics,” which involves raising heifers. When his animals have a calf and start producing milk, they go to another nearby farm to be milked.
His grandfather, Art Logan, milked about 500 cows with his two brothers. Zac’s father, Steve, is a golf course superintendent and part-time farmer who grew up showing animals.
He said Zac really showed an interest in showing cows when he was about 8 or 9 years old.
“He loves the competition of showing the cows, and he loves his cows,” Steve said. “It’s gotten to the point where we spend a good deal of the summer showing cows.”