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Yes, there's a "judge's book" it's called the American Standard of Perfection.
The "bit of studying" involves a minimum of a 2 year apprenticeship with 10 different judges. Reccomendations from those judges that you be allowed to take the exams. Then there's a comprehensive written exam & an equally comprehensive show room exam. It's a bit more involved than you make it sound.
The last part of your comment is true though. People buy a chicken at the feed store, name it Fluffy, take it to a show & can't believe it when they don't win a prize. Then they come on a board like this & make disparaging comments about poultry judges & poultry shows.
Well as we have already demonstrated in another thread there is a major problem with that book in several areas...you would think with all this "training" and so forth, there would be more knowledge of breeds being judged and there would not be mislabeled birds with ribbons hanging on the cage...case in point...the Light Brahma hen marked and ribboned as a Columbian Rock which happened here at the State Fair just recently. How can you expect to judge poultry on a book that has such inconsistency? If you are curious, read the SOP for the Delaware and then read the SOP for the Delaware Bantam. That is ONE example.
How do you think kids get into poultry? You think they all use their allowance to buy an incubator, breeder hatching eggs and choose the best one to take to show? No, most get hatchery stock and take their PET to a show. They start out crawling then they walk and run. That is where breeders come from...starting out at the bottom and working their way up, the same holds true for experts....they start with little or no knowledge and gain knowledge and experience/training to create the expertise.
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Yes frankly it is amazing that Beth or anyone else would want to LEARN. Why should anyone need to do such a thing when there are so many wonderful experts out there already who cannot tell the difference between a RIR and NHR but are judging poultry entered? Again, there is that rude, self induced superior expert opinion again and the pompous attitude I posted of earlier.
You have probably never seen the back scratching mentality because you do not care to notice it. It happens in every other area of showing...Horses, cattle, swine, etc etc etc. Since you are at a loss regarding political decisions that are non-governmental I shall endeavor to help you understand. It is when one makes decisions based on reasonings having nothing to do with fact or good cause but merely on what can be gained or avoided by making the decision. Example - hiring the incompetent nephew of the boss because he is the nephew and it keeps you from loosing your job to hire the useless slug and doing so when there are better qualified candidates for the job. Handing out a blue ribbon for a chicken that looks like death warmed over, has many faults etc etc just because the chicken was entered by the Fair President's daughter and said Fair President decides on who the judges will be...so the ribbon is given so that said judge can return to judge and keep his/her reputation as an expert/judge intact.
Understand better now?
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Nor do your number of posts make you an expert, nor does your training, nor does your signature. How do you formulate your opinions? I would hope that they come from what you have seen, read, done, etc etc which is no different than what any of us have made our opinion from. I have yet to see, in person, a poultry judge that knew what the heck they were doing, which is what my statement was based on....they are PRIMARILY idiots. I gave room for the benefit of a doubt that there were a few good ones by not saying they are ALL idiots. However, even that may change real soon solely based on your responses here, giving the benefit of a doubt is looking more and more like an error on my part.
Thank you Braclin...you are very kind. How is the incubation going? Are there new babies yet?