Yesterday May 14th, was out first goat show. Located in Chino Hills, it was about a 2 hour drive for us. For me, it was my very first show ever, and I learned SO much! I will outline bullet points later about what I meed to remember for next time! We had to leave Saturday morning at 5:30 am, and didn't get home until later that night at 12:30 am. But it was everything that happened in between that was fun!
Tera and I spent about a week prepping and getting ready for everything. This included shaving each goats' entire body, trimming their hooves, monitoring udder fullness, figuring out lists of what we needed to bring, figuring out and filling out entry forms, and packing the truck and trailer. It was quite a feat! I had to head over to the boarding place (Tera's house) right after work and didn't get home most nights until about 9 pm. It was a very tiring week to say the least!
I packed everything I could the night before, and arrived at Tera's place at about 5:15 am. We still had to get the rest of everything in the truck and trailer, and load all the goats. We were a little frantic and ended up leaving 30 minutes later than planned. We needed checklists!!! The drive up there was fun and we were both extremely excited!
We arrived to the fairgrounds just a little after 8 am, just as they were announcing they would start at 9 am. We thought "great!" plenty of time to unload and get everything situated! However, when we went over the pens we pre-entered and paid for, we realized that we were way short. We paid for 4 holding pens, but only 2 were available and they weren't even next to each other. We ended up putting all the girls together in one and all the boys together in the other one; Nubians and Nigerians together, and we had the leave the littlest babies in the dog crate. Despite being short on pens we made it work!
First was the Showmanship Class in which they judge the skills of the handler in how well they show and handle the animal. As far as I can tell it was all youth, under 18. I checked it out but didn't spend much time watching, I wanted to get everything set and get the goats settled.
Finally the show starts! This was a 3 ring show, and me, being new, didn't know what that meant. I didn't even understand how the classes were staged. The hardest part for me was figuring all this out! So three rings mean that there are 3 judges, and that each class is shown under each judge. So essentially each class is shown three times! This makes for a VERY long day. In addition, the show is ADGA sanctioned, so ALL the breeds were there! Talk about a LONG day lol. The classes are broken up as follows; Junior kids, intermediate kids, senior kids, dry yearlings, milking yearlings, 1 year olds, 2 year olds, 3 year olds, 4 year olds, and 5 and over. That's 11 classes per breed, approx 8 breeds, PLUS bucks, and 3 rings- that means there was close to 200 classes judged in ONE day! That's a lot, and it was a LONG day; we didn't finish until about 8:30 pm!
We went through the first few classes watching and figuring out the swing of things. Then we had Tera show Kaya (below) so that I could watch and figure out what to do, and where to go- there is a LOT to know, from which ring to go to, do what direction to walk, to how to walk and set up the doe. I learned SO much!
Tera and I spent about a week prepping and getting ready for everything. This included shaving each goats' entire body, trimming their hooves, monitoring udder fullness, figuring out lists of what we needed to bring, figuring out and filling out entry forms, and packing the truck and trailer. It was quite a feat! I had to head over to the boarding place (Tera's house) right after work and didn't get home most nights until about 9 pm. It was a very tiring week to say the least!
I packed everything I could the night before, and arrived at Tera's place at about 5:15 am. We still had to get the rest of everything in the truck and trailer, and load all the goats. We were a little frantic and ended up leaving 30 minutes later than planned. We needed checklists!!! The drive up there was fun and we were both extremely excited!
We arrived to the fairgrounds just a little after 8 am, just as they were announcing they would start at 9 am. We thought "great!" plenty of time to unload and get everything situated! However, when we went over the pens we pre-entered and paid for, we realized that we were way short. We paid for 4 holding pens, but only 2 were available and they weren't even next to each other. We ended up putting all the girls together in one and all the boys together in the other one; Nubians and Nigerians together, and we had the leave the littlest babies in the dog crate. Despite being short on pens we made it work!
First was the Showmanship Class in which they judge the skills of the handler in how well they show and handle the animal. As far as I can tell it was all youth, under 18. I checked it out but didn't spend much time watching, I wanted to get everything set and get the goats settled.
Finally the show starts! This was a 3 ring show, and me, being new, didn't know what that meant. I didn't even understand how the classes were staged. The hardest part for me was figuring all this out! So three rings mean that there are 3 judges, and that each class is shown under each judge. So essentially each class is shown three times! This makes for a VERY long day. In addition, the show is ADGA sanctioned, so ALL the breeds were there! Talk about a LONG day lol. The classes are broken up as follows; Junior kids, intermediate kids, senior kids, dry yearlings, milking yearlings, 1 year olds, 2 year olds, 3 year olds, 4 year olds, and 5 and over. That's 11 classes per breed, approx 8 breeds, PLUS bucks, and 3 rings- that means there was close to 200 classes judged in ONE day! That's a lot, and it was a LONG day; we didn't finish until about 8:30 pm!
We went through the first few classes watching and figuring out the swing of things. Then we had Tera show Kaya (below) so that I could watch and figure out what to do, and where to go- there is a LOT to know, from which ring to go to, do what direction to walk, to how to walk and set up the doe. I learned SO much!
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Kaya ended up getting last place in two rings and second to last in the third. I learned a lot about the Nubian classes in that they are VERY competitive here in Southern California. Kaya was a first freshener but really needed to be a second freshener for this class. She also needed about an additional 15 pounds. They really like them well conditioned "fat" for the ring. Regardless of her getting last place I'm happy for the experience!
Next up was the two dry yearlings (below). This was a large class with 12 goats, and we brought two for it so myself and Tera were both able to handle. It was my first class and lots of fun! I can't wait to get better at handling. =) Lokilani and Jewel got 9th and 10th in the first ring and second ring, and 6th and 7th in the third ring. Not too bad!!! Again, they could have each had about 10 more pounds on them. I really need a separate pen just to feed the ones going to shows!
Next up was the two dry yearlings (below). This was a large class with 12 goats, and we brought two for it so myself and Tera were both able to handle. It was my first class and lots of fun! I can't wait to get better at handling. =) Lokilani and Jewel got 9th and 10th in the first ring and second ring, and 6th and 7th in the third ring. Not too bad!!! Again, they could have each had about 10 more pounds on them. I really need a separate pen just to feed the ones going to shows!
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Lastly, and most excitedly, was the buck classes! Better late than never! I just had two bucks to show, a senior kid named Kahlua, and my 2 year old buck Jasper. Kahlua got first in all three rings!!! They don't give ribbons for kids unless they place higher than the adults though. Jasper got Reserve Champion in both the first and second rings, and second in the third ring~ though I really felt he should have gotten first. ;)
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So tiring, but had such a fun day!!! Thank you for reading our blog!
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