The annual County Show organised by the Pembrokeshire Agricultural Society is each year, without a doubt, the biggest outdoor attraction and social occasion across West Wales.

Professionally managed and run by a huge band of willing volunteers, the area at the partly-owned 120 acre aerodrome site at Withybush, near Haverfordwest, is fully utilised for the increasingly popular three-day event.

Months in planning, the show costs in excess of £800,000 to stage and introduces a range of special attractions to please all ages of a crowd expected to number in total anything up to 100,000.

All was set fair for this week’s biggest and best ever event with a spectacular opening day that drew in probably the largest first day attendance ever. Sadly, the second day produced a downpour of rain throughout the morning and must have deterred thousands of would-be visitors.

Due to excess water standing on the arenas and car parks, much of the main ring programme had to be curtailed on Wednesday, not least for reasons of safety, but it was hoped that these areas would dry out in time for the last day.

A naturally disappointed president, Ian Fudge and his wife, Lesley, expressed the hope that the third day (yesterday) would make up the loss at the gate in some measure.

He said: “This show has become a shop window for our county and affords a unique opportunity to welcome visitors from far and wide to show what Pembrokeshire is all about.”

Mentioning that the three days at the County Show were the ‘highlights of my summer,’ president-elect, Dennis Reed, recalled with great pride that in 1953 his late father, Bertie, had won the coveted Kylsant Cup on Monkstone, the best ridden Hunter at the show, and in 1993 and 1994, his own daughters, Georgina and Lois, had taken champion and reserve places in the Working Hunter Pony section.

In the cattle judging rings, a particular focus this year was on the Simmental breed and their Wales area championship show: British Simmental cattle, whose origins go back several hundred years to the Simmen valley in Switzerland, were first introduced into the UK in 1970. Since then, the breed has grown to be the fourth largest beef breed in the UK and is claimed to lead the way on the promotion of health in beef breeding cattle.

It is also suggested that Simmental cattle are probably the most genuine ‘dual’ purpose breed that can be crossed successfully with any other breed and produce cows which are extremely milky, fertile, docile and with great natural mothering instincts.

The Simmentals were well-featured in the prestigious Team of Five with eight distinct beef breeds taking up the challenge and took best, with animals selected by the judge, Mr. Iain Green from Morayshire, Scotland, with a award-winning stock from Gethin Lloyd (Carmarthen), Boddington Estates (Cheltenham), Barlow Bros (Preston), Guy van der Gucht (Gloucester) and Brian and Tilly Raymond (Carmarthen).

In the open classes, the winning junior bull was Sterling Ferdinand from Boddington Estates with the Longhorn, Carreg Oak, from Bernard and Margaret Llewellyn in reserve; a winning native breed pair of heifers were the Beef Shorthorns from Alma James ahead of the Welsh Blacks from Marian Phillips; the non- native winners were Limousins from Eddie Griffiths and Son over a Simmental pair from Brian and Tilly Raymond; the group of three award again went to the Llewellyn’s Longhorns which had the edge over Wendy Finucane’s Murray Greys and the supreme individual animal was a Limousin bull, Fasteaux, bred in Carmarthenshire by Tom and Hannah Price with a Simmental from Boddington Estates in reserve.

The overall championships in the horse and pony sections were due to take place on Thursday.

Early results:

HORSES

Shire: John Fletcher.

Welsh Cob, Section D: B. Preston.

Welsh Mountain Pony, Section A: Wendy Lowe Barnes.

Welsh Pony, Section B: Catherine Owen.

Welsh part bred: Timothy Rees.

Ridden Welsh: P. Burnie.

Arab: D. R. Whittome.

Arab, part-bred: Karen Archer.

Palomino: W. J. Canton.

Shetland: Jane Richardson.

Miniature Horse: June Lewis Hughes.

Mountain and Moorland: Anwen Francis.

Riding Pony Breeding: Ruth Rees.

Show Hunter Pony, in hand: Alan Charlesworth.

Show Hunter Pony, under saddle: Leo Bowen.

BEEF CATTLE

Hereford: George, Ionwy and Non Thorne.

Welsh Black: Carwyn Lewis.

Beef Shorthorn: Tim and Kitty Bodily.

Longhorn: G. Woollatt.

Murray Grey: Wendy Finucane.

Simmental: Boddington Estates.

Limousin: Tom and Hannah Price.

British Blue: Jade Phillips.

Any Other Continental: J. H. Hickin.

Commercial: Ifan Phillips.

DAIRY CATTLE

Ayrshire: Philip and Stuart Williams.

Holstein: Simon and Sian Davies.

Jersey: A. H. Wilson and Son.

Brown Swiss: Marc and Sian Williams.

Young handler: Ifan Wilson.

All the sheep and pig classes were scheduled to take place on the last day of the show.