Everybody Had A Hoot At The Bird Show

There were African owls and Dutch booted bantams with feathery legs at the Invercargill Poultry & Pigeon Show at the weekend.   There were even Dorkings with five toes.

A cacophony of sounds came from all corners of the Kennington Kennel Club as the owners of hundreds of birds arrived from all over the South Island to show off their feathered friends. Related: 112+ Years Of Poultry Celebrated In The South This Weekend

You would think it was roosters who were making all the noise, but life member Jill Maxwell-Strang said actually the guinea fowls could certainly drown them out once they got started.

Jill said it was a great show and everyone was really pleased with how it all went.

“The people that came through couldn’t get over how many birds there were.”

Local breeder Rosie Pirie from Myross Bush won Best Bird in Show with her barred Plymouth rock cockerel, and also Best Local Exhibit.

Young breeder Jacob Antonievic, of Invercargill won Best Rare Breed for his North Holland Blue hens, of which he has about 12.

Jacob has been breeding these rare hens for several years but said they weren’t great mothers so he had to hand incubate all of the eggs himself.

With more than 600 entries overall in the annual show that has been an institution in the south for more than 112 years, categories included heavy breed poultry, light breed poultry, game bantams, fancy bantams, water fowl, homing pigeons, fancy pigeons and caged birds.

Because the poultry fraternity is no longer able to import birds into New Zealand because of bird flu, the various shows around the country are keeping some rare breeds from becoming extinct.

Jill said African owls were quite rare and don’t look like normal owls because of their smaller size and bigger eyes.

“They’re about half the size of a homing pigeon,” she said.