AGFEST 2021

AGFEST was a wonderful and rich learning experience for all involved. Twelve students attended the event, the bus and truck were loaded and left on Tuesday 4 May and arrived at AGFEST at 1.00pm to unload our sheep in preparation for the show to begin. It was an amazing atmosphere arriving amongst thousands of other people, animals and machinery all ready to bring this event to life. After setting up the sheep we returned to our camp grounds to set up our marquees and swags that we would be sleeping in for the week, with lots of woollen blankets for the frosty nights!

The sun rose on day one bright and early and the world was covered in frost. Students and staff travelled to AGFEST to feed, water and prepare our sheep with trimming and cleaning. The competitions started that morning with junior judging where students were shown four sheep and were required to judge the quality of the sheep, place them in order of best to worst and then explain why they chose this order to the overseeing judge, Mollie Harris won second place in the Under 15 category. The first afternoon held a novice showing class to give our students a practice run showing their sheep in a Junior Handlers class. Nic Davis won first place and Amelia Geard second place in this event. After the competitions ended the sheep were put to bed, the students had time to look around AGFEST and then we headed back to our camp grounds for spaghetti, homework and practicing fencing for Thursday’s events.

On Thursday students competed in teams of four in the Young Farmers Competition where they needed to handle sheep, stack hay bales, ear tag a cow and show their skills with some fencing knots. One Dominic team consisting of Amelia Geard, Sarah Watson, Mitchell Brown and Nic Davis moved onto the final round where they completed a quiz and had 20 minutes to build a fence to keep a cow in. The team did an amazing job showing their skills and working together and came fourth in this event.

Friday involved the Junior Handlers Competition where students were judged on their ability to handle and show their animals. The judge commended the schools sheep on their presentation and how well they had been prepared for the show. The students all showed very well and bought home more ribbons.

The final day rolled around very early as we needed to pack up our camp grounds before heading into AGFEST. Saturday involved the sheep being judged on which was the best representation of their breed, the students spent a lot of time this morning preparing and walking their sheep before the event began. The sheep went very well and won Interbreed Champion Ram and Reserve Champion Ewe. All students then worked incredibly hard to pack up the sheep and our display for the long journey home, we waved goodbye to AGFEST and returned back to school at 9.00pm to unload and head home.

We are all incredibly proud of our sheep and how our students represented themselves and the College. We would also like to thank Rural Youth and the AGFEST committee for running the event and allowing our students this amazing opportunity. We look forward to more shows to come.

Ms Jane Myers and Ms Kirilee Beveridge - Director of Science K-10 and Animal Husbandry Teacher