It's show time!
Sarah O’Connell is passionate about the sheep and beef industry at work as well as in her spare time. She has the Beef Cattle Stud Carriganes Cattle in Dunsandel and enjoys breeding and showing cattle. At this year’s NZ Agricultural show, the Carriganes team had some great success.
Sarah O’Connell (crouching) with show helpers Kate O’Connell (left) and Hannah Ashworth (right), with cow and calf Delta and Julio
The New Zealand Agricultural Show (formally known as the Canterbury A&P Show) hits the calendar every year in November. I've been involved in the show for a number of years now, getting my first taste showing cattle with the James Family and their Ben More Limousin stud while I was shepherding for them back in 2006. Fast forward a few years and I am at the NZAg Show with my own Angus and Beef Shorthorn cattle under my stud Carriganes Cattle.
I enjoy showing cattle every year, from my local show Ellesmere to the NZ Ag Show. Preparing my cows and calves over the weekends leading up to the shows is satisfying, especially when they behave and perform well, and the time and effort becomes very worth its while.
Mycoplasma Bovis was keeping some people who regularly compete away from the show as the risk was high. The Canterbury A&P Association have worked hard to ensure there were strict protocols in place, that have been approved by MPI, to ensure cattle are kept safe. The possibility of the spread of any disease or bacteria was kept as low as possible. The number of cattle entries were up from 2018 as a result of the success of the protocols put in place last year.
This year I took three cows with calves at foot: Delta, a 6-year-old Angus with her July born calf Julio, Hamersley, a 4-year-old Beef Shorthorn with her July born calf Jazz and Hades, a 2-year-old Beef Shorthorn with her August born calf Jupiter.
We arrived at the show on Tuesday afternoon to get the cows and calves settled in and wash them. The cattle judging starts with individual breed judging on Wednesday morning followed by All Breeds judging on Thursday. In the Angus judging Delta and Julio picked up 2nd place. In the Shorthorn judging Hamersley and Hades both won their classes with Hamersley taking out Supreme Champion Beef Shorthorn and Hades Reserve Champion.
The next class up was the coveted Meat and Wool Cup, a class contested by the Supreme Champion from each breed in attendance, the real cream of the crop. Hamersley was the Beef Shorthorn representative. This class is judged by all of the breed judges who place each of their top 6 animals. The ones with the most points take out the top place ribbons. This year it was won by the Burtergill South Devon Stud with their 3-year-old bull. We did manage a placing mention from one of the judges which was great!
On Thursday afternoon, we started the All Breeds judging with the Senior Cow with Calf at foot class. We had Delta and Hamersley both entered into this class. For the judging of the All Breeds a completely new judge with a new set of eyes and a fresh opinion is brought in who hadn’t seen any of the results from the morning and day before. All Breeds classes can be difficult to judge as you have to decide how well each animal represents its breed and then compare different breeds to one another.
We managed to take out two ribbons in this class, 1st place went to Delta (my Angus) and 5th place went to Hamersley (my Shorthorn). To say we were surprised is a bit of an understatement. To take out an all breeds placing is a great effort, to get two places is pretty good and to top it off, one was a red ribbon! Winning this class meant we progressed through to the All Breeds Championship, going up against each of the other four winners of the All Breeds classes. The judge had his work cut out for him and he spent a long time deliberating between his final 2, my Angus Cow and the South Devon Bull, he chose his Champion as the South Devon meaning we were Reserve Champion. My show ended on a high!
Through my years of showing, I have also been involved in youth shows and getting young people involved in showing. This year I took on the role of Chairperson of the Canterbury A&P Youth Committee, a new committee with the aim of increasing youth at the show, whether it be showing or just coming along to the show for the day – a new challenge. Friday at the show is all about the youth - there are stock handling and stock judging competitions across Dairy, Sheep, Dairy Goats and Beef Cattle for people to compete in. I spent my day working in the beef rings running the beef paraders classes and awarding several scholarships. Watching the young kids move up through the age groups, gain confidence in leading animals, improve their knowledge of judging stock and overall grow as enthusiastic agriculturalists is great. If these kids are our future, then I know we are in good hands.
Come to the end of Friday, everyone, including the animals, is pretty tired. The public has been through the sheds and taken photos of every animal they can, seen sights and smells that they may not have experienced before and hopefully learned a little bit about NZ agriculture. 'The country comes to town' is the phrase thrown about when you talk about the show and it is very true. It is an opportunity for us to show off our hard work and introduce our urban cousins to their rural roots.
On Tuesday afternoon I was also interviewed by Radio New Zealand’s Country Life reporter Cosmo Kentish-Barnes – you can listen to this interview here.