Frankfort, NY Show

This past Saturday the Mohawk Valley Club held their annual show in Frankfort, and I zipped out for the first time in several years to attend it. This is a very nice show in a very nice venue, and even though it was a warm day the doors on the ends and sides of the hall were all open so there was a perfect flow of cool air coming in throughout the day.

I normally don't have anything in coat left at this time of year, but I did manage to dig 4 bunnies out (LOL)---one near the end of her coat, one near the end of her jr weight limit, and two who were NOT in full coat yet but will have to be clipped soon anyway for breeding and for the upcoming summer temperatures.

There were about 25 FAs entered in the shows with 5 exhibitors. The judge for the first show was Helen Brose, and the judge for Show B was Paul Jurgelonis. In Show A the BOB went to Spang's Fabrice and the BOS went to Spang's Sabini (Spang's Karenina picked up her 3rd jr. leg also), and in Show B the BOB went to a Jr. buck that was owned by Marilyn DeMaree and BOS went to a Colored Sr. doe who was owned by either Marilyn or Charlotte Schweikart (sorry, I should have found out exactly who owned these bunnies, LOL).

Here are several pics that were snapped during the show:

The first is of the Angora grooming area (which actually took up a lot more space than just this one wall, LOL).






And these are my own bunnies resting in their carriers after grooming:




This is a picture of my good friends Brian Sawchuk and Donna Grimm who live near my house and are also members of my local rabbit club. Brian is a judge already but Donna is currently working on her license. This was her 6th show out of 8 toward finishing the whole thing up.




This is Dru Shepherd moving stuff around and taking care of her pretty EAs (Hey Dru!:-)




And this is Nancy Platte who came to the show with her buns and also with her husband who was judging. Nancy writes for him often at the shows and occupies herself in between classes with knitting (as any wool person will:-))



And these are Linda Cassella's bunnies (also EAs):





This is Marilyn DeMaree and myself watching the judging in Show B:




And this is the judge in the second show lining up one of the FA Senior classes on the table.

Now, I do not want to openly criticize this judge (I do not know him and this is the first time I have ever had him at a show), but there is no reason whatsoever to be lining angoras up like this in front of their cubbies, mashing them together harder like sardines every time they moved, and then leaving them there during the entire course of judging while checking for DQs and everything else. I realize that not everyone here raises wool breeds, but long term judges like these should at least be aware that random, comical stunts like this result in nothing more than matted coats and overheated, ANNOYED rabbits. I won't say anymore because I do not want a verbal lashing from anyone (at least not tonight:)), but it was a very good thing that these rabbits were healthy and a VERY good thing that it was the end of the show season rather than the beginning:(. I am glad he found this amusing and got a kick out of it all, but it is not the way to handle ANY wool breed, particularly one in full coat in 80 degree weather (end of commentary:( )






Anyway, so that is about it for this week. The next few days here will be spent in separating and evaluating babies since everyone else is pretty much clipped (whew!). Hopefully we will luck out and have a nice cool summer, and the next litters will be born in 70 degrees.

More next time and have a great week!:-)