Annual Agricultural Shows

Next Saturday, on Saturday 3rd August, anyone lucky enough to be spending time in the Brecon Beacons can enjoy a choice of two wonderful agricultural shows that are very different from each other.

Brecon County Show is very special as it is the oldest surviving agricultural society in the UK and in 2005 celebrated its 250th Anniversary – not on the size scale of the Royal Welsh Show of course – more intimate and contained but still with over 200 trade exhibitors and masses of classes for cattle, sheep, goats, horses and ponies.

There is a dog show and dog agility competition, sheepshearing, poultry, ferrets, pigmy goats, milking displays, and in the main ring there is the spectacular Broke FMX Motorcrosse Display Team as well as a Parade of the Brecon & Talybont Hounds.

This is a real day out for everyone!

At the other end of the spectrum really is Llanthony Show which has to be very near the top of the most beautiful sites for a show. It is set deep in the Llanthony Valley near Llanthony Abbey and is surrounded by the Black Mountains. What makes the show so special, apart from its fantastic position, is that it is completely organized by local volunteers with no major corporate sponsorship involved. The Show’s popularity is based on local support on a strictly non-commercial basis. Not something one finds very often these days!

There is rather a nice story about how the Llanthony Show started – there was a critical television documentary in 1959 which called the valley “The Dying Valley” and local people as a result banded together to form the first Show Committee to prove that the valley was anything but dying! And now with fifty more years of the show they certainly have done that!

Two very different shows but both a marvelous experience so I hope visitors come and support them.