I have a few ribbons like that too.. It was 2nd amongst the best in the east coast and a class os 27.. He said the hen that won was just that..tough to fault her....He said the eye on mine just edged her ahead again and again equally matched in almost every way except size..but he thought quality over quantity in this case,, , a lot of those birds were related..Mine was not related toi them..He said she just went ahead because she didnt tend toward beetle brow or sunken face even slightly so he kept bumping her up one..important feature..she was slightly smaller than the rest..but the face and comb were superb , he showed me how when viewed from the front her face bluges very slightly out, and eyes also then showed me another hen and how her face was slightly concave when viewed from the front..When we first got there the only thing I could think was OMG look at those hens they are bigger thsn mine , the games over..thought I would be thrilled with 6th place but probably wont come near that...so many little things to lnow..
I always go to these shows with it in my mind that Im out gunned so that was a suprise and I learned a lot of things about the breed that are not in the standard that day such as grissle in pelvic area ,and how sometimes the beetle brow gives that away.its a sign of a corseness... and the concave vs convex face and eye shape and size the little things that can set you apart or give you an edge that I just didnt know..The judge was a bit of a specialist in the english breeds and very good at helping to understand things ..I didnt know about the importance of the eye shape and size along with all of the other componants.. he said grissle is the bain of the australorp breeders world but I never got to ask why..might have something to do with egg laying? not sure. He asked me why I chose her..I said I liked the eye too thought it was good and knew she had good width and meaty nice wide feather ect...she just appealed to me..kept rocords of her egg laying habits and she laid 302 eggs last year. Said I didnt thinkmthat I stood a chance when I saw these bigger birds, he said again...quality over quantiy, the right rooster can give her offspring more size ..but its tough to work out sunken eye and fishtail combs. He said I wouldnt call her a corner stone but a very good building block to a good show flock.
