Marking end of a season

Sophie and Chase Stevens meet a pair of miniature ponies in a petting zoo organized by the Bark and Moo 4-H club.

Sunny skies and warm temperatures drew steady crowds to the city's downtown area on Saturday as the community came together for a day of good-natured fun and entertainment on Saturday.

The 20th Annual Fall Harvest Festival marked the unofficial end of southern Idaho's yearly farming season.

Hosted each year by the Mountain Home Chamber of Commerce, it traces its origins from the local Oktoberfest but then took on a life of its own and grew with the community, local organizers said.

Mike Aug belts out a classic rock song as the local band Relroc performs during the 20th Annual Fall Harvest Festival, held Saturday in downtown Mountain Home.

According to chamber officials, approximately 1,000 people attended this year's festival.

Among the new attractions this year was a jam and jelly tasting contest, held in conjunction with the yearly pie-baking competition. The number of pie entries this year was up significantly with people invited to sample one of 11 homemade entries, said Kathy Wudyka as she held up one of the pies.

Those entries were overshadowed by the 13 jams and jellies making their debut on Saturday. The one that seemed to get the most votes early that day was a boysenberry creation, Wudyka said.

Ted Thompson holds up a red pepper donated by a local farm that was later given away as part of the yearly "Dinner on a Farmer" promotion. Organizers handed out 50 pounds of peppers that day in addition to 1,200 pounds of locally grown potatoes as well as other vegetables.

For many of the youngsters attending the festival, it was a chance to get a first hand look at farm life. At a display on East 2nd Street, Sophie Stevens and her younger brother, Chase, reached out to pet a pair of miniature ponies in a display organized by the Bark and Moo 4-H club in Mountain Home.

As people made their way along the sidewalks in downtown Mountain Home, many paused to check out the 26 booths offering everything from homemade crafts to an assortment of food. The one that seemed to draw a lot of curious onlookers was the Amazing Bottle Bazooka display that was selling toy rifles that used compressed air to fire soda bottles downrange.

Among those checking out the guns was Jeremy Fossum, who scored a direct hit as he fired a round at Tyler Hughes, who was wearing a full suit of padded armor to absorb the impact.

Nearby, local artist Bob West drew curious onlookers as he continued to work on his canvas. During a recent trip to Montana, he snapped a photo of a vintage vehicle in which the owners had turned the engine block into a flower garden.

West tentatively planned to call his finished oil painting "flower power" in reference to the hippie movement of the late 1960s.

A couple of attractions at Saturday's festival helped showcase southern Idaho's reputation as a leader in agriculture. This included the "Dinner on a Farmer" promotion where local growers donated some of their produce, which is then handed out to harvest participants.

City representative Paula Szafranski and local airport manager Ted Thompson were among the handful of volunteers that were busy packing potatoes in bags as people stopped by to take home some of these homegrown spuds. Local farmers had donated approximately 1,200 pounds of spuds along with 200 pounds of onions, 200 pounds of beans and 50 pounds of red peppers specifically for the community festival.

The free farm promotion remains part of an overall effort to raise awareness and protect farming and dairy industries in the county, according to festival organizers.