Bumper crowd at English Winter Fair
The 2015 English Winter Fair, organised by the Staffordshire and Birmingham Agricultural Society at Bingley Hall, on Staffordshire County Showground, was a great success, building on the much improved event held in 2014.
There was a record entry of livestock and carcases, more than a 1,000 in total, and a huge crowd packed around the main ring to watch the sale for £7,600 of the Supreme Champion at the end of the second day.
The incorporation of the Cogent inspired and funded National Pedigree Calf Show has added immeasurable interest to this 200-year-old Christmas fatstock show. This year there were 220 entries of young Simmental, Limousin, Belgian Blue and AOB cattle up to 16 months of age.
Similar renewed interest has been shown by sheep breeders. Suffolks had disappeared from this show in recent years but were back alongside Swaledales for the first time, four sub classes of mountain breeds, and newcomers such as the Blue Texel. Pig numbers were up 50 per cent, greatly encouraged I am sure, by competitions such as sausage making, for young pig breed family members.
Some 300 Young Farmers from 24 counties competed in the two nationally recognised stock judging events. There was a subsidised dinner for them on the first night.
NFU vice-president Minnette Batters commented on the great strength of young member participation at this show when she presented a stock handling award. She deplored the low value put on beef from the national suckler herd, achieving no more than the price paid for beef from the progeny of dairy cows. The suckler herd is in demise and she said quality beef demands and must command a differentiating quality price.
The Supreme Champion was Red Hot Honey, a 19-month-old Limousin-sired heifer exhibited by Mark Harryman and his partner Sarah Warriner from Pickering, Yorkshire, which had already taken the championships at six previous shows including the Great Yorkshire. Sold at the end-of-show sale by Bagshaw's auctioneer Mark Elliott, she brought a top bid of £7,600 from George Cropper, the show's carcase competitions judge, a wholesale and retail butcher from Accrington, Lancashire.