The Accidental Smallholder Forum

Livestock => Sheep => Topic started by: Bionic on August 15, 2013, 08:32:39 am

Title: Wish me luck
Post by: Bionic on August 15, 2013, 08:32:39 am
My first ever sheep showing today and its pouring with rain  :gloomy:  Still, that might be a good thing.
My lambs look very bedragled as they haven't been trimmed but then surely everyones sheep are going to look bedragled in the rain ?
Off to give them a last look over now
Title: Re: Wish me luck
Post by: bloomer on August 15, 2013, 08:41:24 am
good luck


the rain is my fault i needed a dry day to finish a job and had it pencilled in for today, obviously no dry day for anyone sorry!!!
Title: Re: Wish me luck
Post by: suziequeue on August 15, 2013, 08:49:13 am
Good luck Sally. Fortunately - the real prize (what you learn from the event) will be awarded to you regardless of the sheep :-))
Title: Re: Wish me luck
Post by: Fleecewife on August 15, 2013, 09:03:48 am
Ooh good luck Sally  :hshoe:   Will be thinking of you.  Give us a full report afterwards.
Title: Re: Wish me luck
Post by: Clarebelle on August 15, 2013, 09:13:07 am
good luck!  :thumbsup:
Title: Re: Wish me luck
Post by: happygolucky on August 15, 2013, 09:27:48 am
Well its wet for everyone else too, a shame but good luck and hope to see some lovely photos and a winning rosette :wave:
Title: Re: Wish me luck
Post by: Brucklay on August 15, 2013, 09:42:26 am
Your probably on your way so sending good vibes - hope you have a fun day.  :hshoe:
Title: Re: Wish me luck
Post by: SallyintNorth on August 15, 2013, 10:05:22 am
Best of luck!   :hshoe: :sheep:

Looking forward to hearing all about it and hopefully some piccies  :)
Title: Re: Wish me luck
Post by: Backinwellies on August 15, 2013, 10:17:12 am
Good Luck.  :hshoe:  :fc:
Title: Re: Wish me luck
Post by: Daisys Mum on August 15, 2013, 10:28:06 am
Good luck hope your having a good day  :thumbsup:
Title: Re: Wish me luck
Post by: Mammyshaz on August 15, 2013, 10:31:48 am
Good luck Sally.Whatever happens enjoy your experience  :trophy:  :thumbsup:
Title: Re: Wish me luck
Post by: kanisha on August 15, 2013, 11:45:32 am
Have a great day!  :fc:
Title: Re: Wish me luck
Post by: feldar on August 15, 2013, 03:28:30 pm
Good luck Sally, I show too, so have a lovely time and let us know how you get on :trophy:
Title: Re: Wish me luck
Post by: Bionic on August 15, 2013, 06:57:23 pm
Well my lambs came 5th and 6th out of 6  :(  but that wasn't surprising when we saw the opposition - bright mustard suffolk lambs that were the size of small horses. The whole family were preening them to an inch of their lives while mine were pretty unkempt. Afterwards the judge said he just didn't know what to do with ours.
Sorry if I offend anyone with Suffolks but why do they have to put that horrible colour on them?
Archie (dog) did much better. First in the any variety non sporting, first in the best trimmed, highly commended best local dog and 3rd in the long or rough coated.
I also got a first for my baked cheesecake, a first for a knitted hat and a first for my rag cusgion in the item made from recycled material class. My chutney came 3rd.
I will post some piccies tomorrow
 
Title: Re: Wish me luck
Post by: bloomer on August 15, 2013, 06:59:28 pm
don't know anything about sheep, the rest of that lot sounds awesome though.


can i have the baked cheesecake recipe sometime please!!!
Title: Re: Wish me luck
Post by: Mammyshaz on August 15, 2013, 07:11:57 pm
Sounds like you had a busy day. Well done to Archie too  :dog: he will need his own trophy cabinet if he continues like this  :excited:
What did the judge mean, he didn't know what to do with them!  he just doesn't know a proper sheep when he sees one  :huff:  ;)    ;D

Well done on your home crafts. Id love to judge your cheesecake  :yum:



Title: Re: Wish me luck
Post by: suziequeue on August 15, 2013, 07:12:48 pm
FANTASTIC!!! So SO WELL DONE :-)))


Delighted. Well done. that takes guts :-))
Title: Re: Wish me luck
Post by: Backinwellies on August 15, 2013, 07:35:33 pm
well done Archie.   :excited:
Title: Re: Wish me luck
Post by: zarzar on August 15, 2013, 08:13:44 pm
Well done im glad if we decide to show our portlands they like to see them in their work wear
Title: Re: Wish me luck
Post by: Fleecewife on August 15, 2013, 08:54:09 pm
Suffolks are highly commercial sheep and for them to be competing against your Ryelands makes for a very difficult class to judge.  If the judge was a commercial man then he would go for the Suffolks any time.  We have had the opposite when our Soay have been competing against Ryelands, and the Ryelands win hands down every time - I suppose the judge has to go with what he knows and will be impressed with size.  Don't be put off Sally, next time in a different class, at a different show and with a different judge you could come out on top.
I would say you had a pretty successful day all round  :trophy: :thumbsup:  Well done - I'm really impressed with your successes  ;D
Title: Re: Wish me luck
Post by: Brucklay on August 15, 2013, 09:04:52 pm
Well done Sally and Archie of course - slice of cheesecake here to just feeling a bit hungry - hope you had a fun day  :thumbsup:
Title: Re: Wish me luck
Post by: ZaktheLad on August 15, 2013, 09:08:28 pm
Well done on having a go with the sheep - it's all good experience and at the end of the day one what win one week may come well down the line the next.  From your pics of your lambs shown on one of your other posts, I think you should be very proud of your stock - they look lovely and you have done an excellent job with them.  If showing is something you really want to do with them, then practise makes perfect - those people with the Suffolk's have probably been showing for years.  As with dog showing (often the wrong end of the lead getting judged) and with showing horses (often the rider not the horse that wins the prize)  :innocent: :-J, it may be that at times other types of animal showing is the same  :innocent: I know this is not always the case and the majority do win on their own merit, but there also is a lot of who you know in the showing world. 

Very well done on your other successes though - excellent results.
Title: Re: Wish me luck
Post by: SallyintNorth on August 16, 2013, 07:30:06 am
Wow that's quite a haul!  Well done!   :thumbsup:   Getting placed with handicrafts and baking in a local show, let alone getting 1sts, is some achievement if it's anything like up here.   :notworthy:

Re: the sheep, on the plus side it sounds as though it wouldn't have made any difference if you had spent loads of time and effort washing and primping them!  :D  Keep at it, the judges will go away and look up info about Ryelands  :thumbsup:, and who knows, maybe they'll even introduce classes for traditional/native sheep in some future year... (which is what we have up here.)

Respect  :thumbsup: :-*

Edited to add congrats and a hug to Archie.  :love: :dog:
Title: Re: Wish me luck
Post by: Simon O on August 16, 2013, 08:29:10 am
Well done anyway, it is pretty good just to have got them there and shown. I agree with you about the colour.
Title: Re: Wish me luck
Post by: ladyK on August 16, 2013, 10:05:20 am
That's an impressive list of successes, well done!  :thumbsup:
Personally, having to inflict all this show coiffure on a poor sheep would put me off showing, so well done for daring to show them as they are meant to be!
Title: Re: Wish me luck
Post by: feldar on August 19, 2013, 09:37:47 am
Well done Sally.
I know what you mean about the colour, some of the Beltex breeders dye their's an awful orange/ yellow. Apparently it's part traditional to colour them and also the pearl dip tightens the fleece and makes the whole sheep feel better ???    we show our hamps in their natural colour, much nicer, although some do colour them as well   ::)
Well done you had a productive day. And as said, don't get too hung up on the judging. I had one judge say to me once when i was put down the line." i don't know much about your breed!!" to which i said " why are you judging them then?"    I got no reply.
Title: Re: Wish me luck
Post by: SallyintNorth on August 19, 2013, 10:04:44 am
I had one judge say to me once when i was put down the line." i don't know much about your breed!!" to which i said " why are you judging them then?"    I got no reply.
Which was your chance to educate him/her...  :-J
Title: Re: Wish me luck
Post by: feldar on August 19, 2013, 11:57:18 am
I had one judge say to me once when i was put down the line." i don't know much about your breed!!" to which i said " why are you judging them then?"    I got no reply.
Which was your chance to educate him/her...  :-J
Your quite right Sally, i would have done, but in the heat of the moment  in the middle of a show ring it's maybe not the place to start that conversation.
I had one judge just this year get quite intimidating towards me in a show ring berating me for bringing what he considered to be a poor quality animal in the ring. After taking his nonsense for a while i just walked on back to the tent having said to him that it was his judgement but i didn't have to agree with him.
Other classes were waiting to come in the ring and he was holding them up trying to " educate " me. If he didn't like my sheep that's fine, but he didn't have to be so rude about it.
The same sheep has gone on to win other classes at other shows and was placed at our national show and sale so i know he's not rubbish. He's just not an overstuffed, poor on his legs show sheep, he's aTraditional Hampshire tup who will go on to do his job, without needing vast amounts of grub to do it. I just wish i'd had the balls (excuse the pun) to tell that judge that. :eyelashes: 
Title: Re: Wish me luck
Post by: SallyintNorth on August 19, 2013, 12:10:00 pm
Wow, I wish you'd educated that second judge too!

I'm wondering about suggesting a Hampshire Down to BH for our next experiment... but it would maybe make for too many breeds in the mix.  They do sound good though.
Title: Re: Wish me luck
Post by: feldar on August 19, 2013, 04:03:15 pm
I can always think of what to say to people afterwards, but at the time i'm so dumbstruck on how rude someone can be that i don't react quickly enough. I am glad he said it to me and not my other half or we may have needed to sustitute the judge, i'm sure hubby would have hit him :o
Anyway do try a Hamp Sally there are some good ones about. We are going to put a tup accross some Lleyns this year and see what happens :fc: