A view from the festival (From Smallholder)

A view from the RWAS festival

12:37pm Wednesday 8th February 2012 in News

Few poultry exhibitors could have imagined, in 1994, when the poultry Club of Wales was established, that the Royal Welsh Showground at Llanelwedd, Builth Wells, would play host to three new major poultry shows.Originally set up to foster and encourage interest in poultry breeding and exhibiting in Wales, the Club was directly responsible for creating, firstly, the now well established poultry section’s of the annual Royal Welsh Winter Fair.

Together with officials from the Royal Welsh Agricultural Society, we were able to welcome over nine hundred entries to the first event held in 1994 and incidentally, it is worth noting that the Welsh Royal Crystal prizes are some of the most valuable prizes at any poultry show anywhere within the United Kingdom.

The second major show established as a result of the Poultry Club of Wales was its own Welsh Federation Championship Show, held annually in October on the Saturday of the largest Welsh Cob Sale in the world.

With over twelve hundred entries, members of the Poultry Club of Wales are naturally proud to be able to manage at a fraction of the cost of other major shows.

This has been achieved as a result of a partnership between the Club and the Royal Welsh Agricultural Society when we were successful in our joint application to the Welsh Assembly for grant aid to purchase our own set of cages. These are now used for four major shows, all of which are held at Builth Wells.

The club is determined to portray this wonderful show as the main poultry show in Wales and a substantial trophy known as the Dragon in Slate, is awarded as a keepsake to the show champion.

The third show, now in its third year, is the club’s spring show held during the annual Royal Welsh Smallholder & Garden Festival, now known as the Royal Welsh Spring Festival.

Members voted to establish this event in an attempt to reverse the trend of the last five years or so of shutting some of the long established local shows. The spring show has certainly captured the imagination and we now see well over six hundred entries collect at Builth Wells accompanied by an enthusiastic group of exhibitors, many of whom are within the juvenile and junior age bracket.

The Poultry Club of Wales, under its chairman, Paul Tucker, and its joint secretaries, Edward and Jean Page, are proud of the reputation of our shows at Builth Wells and are determined to make everyone feel welcome in the heart of beautiful Mid Wales.

The 2012 calendar of poultry shows includes the Spring Festival on Saturday 19 May, the Welsh Federation Championship on Saturday, October 20, and the Winter Fair on Tuesday, November 27.