Question for anyone who has shown at a fair...

[ChicksinFL]

My daughter is showing 12 of our chickens for the first time at the Florida State Fair in just a couple weeks. I'm sitting here looking at the schedule trying to decide if I have to be there every day or not. The fair feeds and waters the chickens while they are there, I know I have to be there for showmanship and skillathon day but do we need to take the 2 hr one way drive for the judging days.

They check in on the 14th so that is a trip over and back home... the 15th is just grooming box judging which we didn't enter but I figured it would be a drive over and back that day so she can shine her chickens up for the 16th when judging starts at 10a.. there is nothing else that day she is doing..

I'm not sure if I need to have my daughter standing around all day for the 16that.. at 8 she's not going to stand for too long without being totally bored. Not to mention we only get 14 tickets and she wants her dad to go every day too so I have buy an extra 7 tickets if we go every day plus gas there and back every day. This could get too expensive fast and I guess I should of thought about this before now but like I said this is our first time showing so didn't think about all these things yet. I can't stay in Tampa as we don't have a farm sitter for all the animals left behind.... so have to drive back and forth so we can care for animals in the AM and PM.

Edited to fix days... there is only one day she has nothing to do there it's just judging day.

 

[Oregon Blues]

It's usually possible to give a 4-H kid a few dollars to check your birds a couple of times a day to make sure they are OK and have food and water and a clean pen.

If I've got a show that is a distance and more than one day, I stay there. I've bought a travel trailer specifically for showing so I can be comfortable and have all my dogs with me. So I don't have any advice about driving back and forth.

Perhaps the adults could take turns babysitting the farm?

There should be a ton of stuff to do and see at a State fair. Not much sitting around. Also, the kids seem to like to visit.

Are the birds being judged in cages? Are you sure? 4-H here, the kids take their birds out of the cage and put them on the judging table. Or are your birds entered in open?

 

[ChicksinFL]

Our birds are entered in Youth and I have no idea about if the kids have to put the birds on the judges table. All it says is that it's being judged by APA ABA rules nothing about having the kids put the chickens on a judging table.

I know showmanship is one day and we plan to do that and that is the day I know she has to handle the bird that is suppose to be her showmanship bird for the judge (which should be fun since her showmanship bird just went broody so we are using a back up bird).

I guess I'll be driving back and forth each day and taking a cooler with food to leave in the car so we can cut expenses by going out to the car and sitting in down in the quiet to have lunch/snacks each day.

Thanks for sharing your experience with me, thinking we won't be doing multi day shows like this again.

 

[hdowden]

best advice i can give is to ask the people there that are singing you in and giving you the tags. i know here in leesville, la you dont have to be there for any part of the chickens and they feed and water them but its always best to aske the people running the show as to what you need to do and if you need to be there everyday (which i doubt you will need to). i know they have be brought there by a certain and picked up on a certain day once the showings are over.

again best thing to do is ask the people that are running the show as in defferent states and areas its all different so all in all we can give you a general idea of what to expect

 

[ChicksinFL]

Thank you... I will be asking a TON of questions at check in. I feel like we are in the ocean floating without a life boat right this moment. Never in a million years did I think showing poultry would be this hard.. my 16 yr old has shown horses for 12 yrs and it has never seemed this hard but I guess that is because you have a trainer there to guide you then I learned the ropes myself.

I know we have to be there for showmanship day and skillathon but I was hoping to cut out any drives that aren't really needed especially because we are there the weekend before for Dairy goats. It's going to be a long two weeks..

 

[ChicksinFL]

OH well now I'm thinking I'm just going to not take her at all...... Today I realized I have entered her showmanship bird in the wrong variety she'll be DQ'd which will be so upsetting to my lil one and all my fault. When we bought the birds my older daughter told me over and over they weren't Brown/Reds but I didn't look into it until today. I was going to the ABA book with my younger daughter and realized our OEG's don't fit the standard for Brown/Reds so I then asked my daughter what she thought they were back when we bought them she said Blue/Red. I posted here in the breed/gender forum hoping I'd be told they were indeed aged brown/reds nope only person to answer says Black breasted Reds.

None of the other birds going including are silkies are really easy for my lil one to handle for showmanship the silkies just have too much fluff her tiny lil hand just can't get around it all and the Polish are too skittish.. there is the D'Uccles but they aren't overly friendly and their tons of foot feathers though so pretty is a struggle for the lil one with tiny hands.

I'm out 72 dollars at this point but I guess maybe it's better to cut our loses now and instead of having her get upset that she can't do showmanship that is the only part of the show she was really looking forward to.

 

[Hanna8]

I'm a 4H'er and show in the Central Florida Fair, and they will allow you to make some last-minute changes in the entries for mess-ups like that (mostly mis-sexing a pullet or cockerel). I don't know about the state fair but I would go ahead and check, they should understand. Especially since your daughter is an 8 year old 4H'er who is showing poultry for the first time. If they can't do anything about it, I honestly would go anyway. The birds won't do well, but that won't have any bearing on her showmanship and the skill-a-thon that you have been preparing for. And then you'll have a much better idea what to expect next year! The first show is mostly just for figuring out what's going on anyway. She'll have a leg-up on next year's competition if she goes this year!

 

[ChicksinFL]

So if the bird gets DQ'd it won't mean she can't use it for showmanship? Thank you so much for your reassuring post, I have emailed the superintendent but that was to see about subbing what I thought was a brown/red cock for our splash OEG cockerel because he was injured last night. Now that bird wouldn't even be entered right because now I know he's not a brown/red just like his hen, haven't heard back though. UGH.. I'll have to have a sit down with the lil one and discuss my total mess up and make sure she knows that her showmanship bird will most likely be DQ'd for being in the wrong variety. Maybe if I hear back from the superintendent I can get this fixed or hopefully be told that we can make minor changes like that at fair check in.

 

[Hanna8]

Nope! It wouldn't keep her from doing showmanship at the Central Florida Fair, anyway. It's more than likely the same at the state fair. I highly doubt they'll stop her. They want the kids using the birds they are most comfortable with, whether or not they do well in judging. The judge for showmanship will ask her what kind of bird she has during showmanship, and she can say what it actually is then for some points. With 4H'ers, they really try to make it fun for kids, help them learn, and get them to stay interested in poultry showmanship as the years go by. They won't traumatize your daughter by telling her she can't do showmanship.

If I'm completely wrong and there is an issue with her being unable to compete in showmanship because her bird was DQd, you could talk to the superintendent and they would be happy to let her do showmanship without judging her against everybody else, just to give her the experience. (And you don't necessarily have to tell her about that little arrangement...)

 

[Sonoran Silkies]

So if the bird gets DQ'd it won't mean she can't use it for showmanship? Thank you so much for your reassuring post, I have emailed the superintendent but that was to see about subbing what I thought was a brown/red cock for our splash OEG cockerel because he was injured last night. Now that bird wouldn't even be entered right because now I know he's not a brown/red just like his hen, haven't heard back though. UGH.. I'll have to have a sit down with the lil one and discuss my total mess up and make sure she knows that her showmanship bird will most likely be DQ'd for being in the wrong variety. Maybe if I hear back from the superintendent I can get this fixed or hopefully be told that we can make minor changes like that at fair check in.

As long as she knows what the correct variety of hte bird is, it should be fine for showmanship. In showmanship it is the HUMAN, and their knowledge of their animal that is judged, not the animal itself. I have never heard of a DQ during showmanship. They assign points based upon knowledge, and the person with the most points wins. Worst case scenario is that she would lose some points for not knowing the variety of the bird. Now if her showmanship bird is also entered in exhibition (be it youth or open), it might be DQed there, but that should not affect her using it for showmanship.