ollie should have a fun day tomorrow

[colmworthdales]

Just about to go and bathe a hot dirty lady before we are off in the morning to enjoy ourselves at the Horseheath Country Fair where she will be on our Rare Breeds Survival Trust stand under a lovely fancy gazebo. She was much admired there last year, in fact I had to work quite hard not to sell her to two very keen potential buyers!

The organisers never quite get round to getting a Show Holding Number for the site (where the Point-to-points are run between Haverhill and Cambridge) which means no cloven-hooved animals can attend as they need to be officially moved on and off any showground! So it will be down to Mollie and a couple of pens of rare breed chickens to impress the public.  We will have RBST Merchandise for sale, and the information stand.  Mollie's pen will decorated with her photo board and a selection of the bling she has won over the past year. 

Hope the wonderful roast rare breeds pork food stand will be there again, as well as good coffee - and possibly a cider tent.  Last year there was a tremendous display of events in the main ring which we overlook, so Mollie was not bored at all.

Quite glad I am not going to a riding show, as I hate riding in jacket and boots in this weather.

Will take some photos and put them on here in a few days if I can beat the technology!

[colmworthdales]

Whoops - didn't check the title line! Mollie - not Ollie

[Fi]

Sounds fab, looking forward to seeing some pics. Hope its not tooooo hot for you all

[yanny]

Ooft, pork, cider, horses, sounds like my kind of event!!!
Hope it goes well!!

[valerie n scout]

Oh sounds like a fantastic day x

[colmworthdales]

Thanks folks - yes it was a lovely day. Slightly marred by heavy drizzle this morning for a couple of hours which put a lot of people off turning out - but a big crowd of people turned up in the afternoon, although the overall attendance was down on last year.

We had a great view as our stand was about 10 yards from the ring and Mol was very interested in it all. She was a star as usual and certainly did her bit for breed promotion.  She is so good with children and really freezes when tinies are trying to reach up and touch her.  She was on the stall just after 9, and the first photo shows her looking about for people to come and talk to her!  The other two were quick shots of families with her.  Probably she was stroked by 300 people at least (I always forget to count!) and only turned away occasionally to grab a mouthful of hay before coming back to talk again.   I might have convinced at least two people to look seriously at buying a Dales as their next mount. She stood in her pen until well after 4 when I took her out and loaded her straight into the trailer so she could have a proper munch on her hay net while I helped the others take down all our stuff and displays etc.

The chickens (Scotch Greys) were also a big attraction and several people took leaflets and talked seriously to their owner - so hopefully there will be more sales of them as well.

Shame there was not a huge crowd as the ring events were fab - gundog training demo with lots of young dogs working with the owners under the guidance of their teacher; a very good falconry demo and the lost merlin did turn up after about 15 minutes! There was a fantastic hound display with 3 foot packs in the ring together - beagles, harriers and bloodhounds and then a proper mounted display from the local Fox (sorry drag!) hunt; and a superb sheepdog display with a young year old bitch being trained, and her 9 year old mum showing her how it should be all done. Also a really good display by Percherons (a pair and a single) pulling beautifully restored vintage vehicles.

[harveydales]

Well done molly. What a great job promoting the breed.


I will have to get in touch with you before the Newark rare breed show in November so you can fill me in on how to prepare the stand.
Sent from my Nexus 10 using proboards

[dalesnfellfan]

Sounds like you and Mollie had a lovely day, my Spud would have loved doing that he always loved an admiring audience. Lovely photos