June 2016: Suffolk Show

The Suffolk Show is always enjoyable, whatever the weather, for its mixture of animals in competition, colourful machinery, food, flowers and fashion, as well as a whole range of other agricultural and domestic products and services on sale.
The livestock competitions generally start well-organised, as is the case with the Percherons, above. The heavy horses have their own styles of decoration, as is evidenced by the boxes of accoutrements brought by one owner.

Some animals do not understand the requirement for good behaviour and occasionally, during the course of their event, standards gradually drop.

This was particularly the case with these pigs, whose event started as an orderly parade, but which quickly degenerated into friendly get-together.

Meanwhile, other animals patiently await their turn.


These bulls, however, were well-behaved and made a dignified showing.

Eventually, all of these animals are, no doubt, destined for a common fate.

Show visitors are assisted in the process by a stream of cookery demonstrations during the day, featuring local chefs and restauranteurs.

The event is, of course, aimed at both farmers and consumers. Whichever category you fall into, the machinery on show is both colourful and interesting in design, whether old…

…or new…

I was less impressed with the Art exhibition, which would have been better described as decoration or, to be charitable, design.

Back to the animals, there was, as usual, an attractive variety of hens on show.

I am sure they would love to be living in one of these hen houses, of which there were several luxury styles on offer.

There are so many items on sale, not only for the farm or garden, but also clothing and furnishings. To end it all, there was even funeral director’s marquee, offering an unusual method of transport for that final journey.

No doubt useful if you are in an unlikely hurry or in heavy traffic.