New board resurrects show
The new chair of the Canterbury A&P Association (CAPA) board, Sir David Carter, is pleading for public support for this year's Christchurch Show.
A fashion parade of wool-based garments will run in the shearing pavilion at lunch time, on both Friday and Saturday.
A Grand Parade will take place both Friday and Saturday and all of the youth competitions will be on Saturday morning.
Most of the regular attractions are back, including sheep dog trials, pipe bands, Shetland pony races, a Clydesdale display, showjumping, the City Farmyard and Rare Breeds.
The Wood Chopping will feature a South Island versus New South Wales test match, held across all three days.
New for this year is a Cowboy Challenge competition for horse and rider completing a series of tasks, to be held indoors along with a farrier competition in the Riding for the Disabled building at the south end of the main ring.
For A&P Association members there will be a cocktail party on the Friday night which Chamberlain hopes will encourage new or renewing members after numbers "drifted off a bit" in recent years. There has been a pleasing lift in membership numbers this year.
Read More:
- Elite sheep dogs to go head-to-head at Ashburton A&P Show
- Royal A&P Show returns to Canterbury: Record livestock entries and renewed prestige
- Record entries for Canterbury Clash of the Colleges
"Membership is not just about getting free tickets to the show. It's about supporting this iconic Cup and Show Week show for the future," he says.
"We need to keep this show going for future generations through the next hundred and something years."
Both Brent Chamberlain and his wife Wendy come from farming families with long histories with the A&P movement, Wendy having been a recent president of their local Courtenay Show at Kirwee.
Brent's involvement with the Canterbury show began when he helped show cattle for his then employer in 1978. He progressed to head steward of the cattle section for many years, then chaired the sheep section. He was elected to the general committee about 15 years ago.
"I'm the fourth Chamberlain president in 160 years of the Canterbury A&P Show. We're all related."
With a background in animal health for both Novartis Animal Health and Ravensdown, Chamberlain is now an On Farm Account Manager for the Mid Canterbury-based farmer owned co-op Ruralco and he appreciates their support during his role as President.
He runs about 60 Dohne ewes, a South African Merino breed, on their 10 acre home block near Darfield, selling the lambs as hoggets, and also grazes a number of other 10 acre blocks in the area.
"So that keeps my hand in farming," says Chamberlain.
The couple both enter items such as Christmas cakes and preserves in various shows, and Chamberlain intends to show four of his merino fleeces at the Canterbury Show.
The Race Is On
The shift to a Thursday-Friday-Saturday show potentially creates a clash with another of the traditional major events of the Canterbury Cup and Show Week calendar, the New Zealand Cup gallops meeting at Riccarton.
A show stalwart, Tai Tapu champion Holstein Friesian breeder Dean Geddes, did not support the change, partly because for him the races are his day off.
The show is a big commitment for Geddes as he takes his animals to the showgrounds about three days early, to get them acclimitised to their surroundings and the chlorinated town supply water, and while there they need 24-hour supervision and milking.
While he can take them a day later this year, it also means they have to stay a day later and he will have to get someone else to manage them on the Saturday.
"I'm still going to the races on Saturday," he said.
"It's my only day out for the year. I enjoy it after being so busy for so long."
Geddes says he has about 18 animals entered for the show but will probably end up taking about eight or ten.
He hopes the clash of the two events does not affect each other's attendance too much as they probably attract different groups of people.
Asked if the exhibitors are generally supportive of the new timetable, Chamberlain said the entry numbers "tell us a good story".
"It is change. But at this stage we've gone for the three days, and the general committee are supportive of it. So, we'll just get in behind and make it happen."
