By Dale Cory
The pre-event advertising promo for the 2010 Ponoka County Fair read: “The Fun Side of Agriculture.”
Judging by the smiles on the faces of the many children in attendance at the Ponoka Stampede grounds last weekend, the Ponoka Ag Society appears to have achieved its goal.
“We absolutely accomplished what we wanted to,” insists Ponoka Ag Society president Sherry Gummow. “The county fair has morphed over the last five to six years. There were a lot of families there, and lots of fun for the kids. And some of the artwork in the bench show was phenomenal. We were very pleased overall.”
The event keeps getting bigger, and local residents, along with those from surrounding communities, are starting to take notice.
“We figure between 1,500 to 1,700 patrons came through the gates through the two days,” says Gummow.
There was something for everyone who attended the two-day event, from western events such as team roping, barrel racing and the wild and woolly sheep demo, to fun competitions for kids, including lawn tractor racing, sumo wrestling and face painting.
Rainbow The Clown was also in attendance to entertain the many children seen walking the Stampede Grounds, many of whom were from outside the community.
New to the Ponoka County Fair this year was an event known as the ranch rodeo. Based on traditional ranch experiences, the ranch rodeo included four events — cattle doctoring, cattle sorting, cattle branding and cattle loading.
By all accounts, the ranch rodeo is here to stay.
“The ranch rodeo definitely added to the fun side to things, and enhanced the overall event,” says Gummow. “It wasn’t the professionals you see at the Stampede. It was the neighbour down the road who you help with branding in spring. This new feature to the County Fair brought out some new people, and added a different dimension to rodeo.”
For the Ponoka Ag Society, it’s all about improving an already solid event.
“What we’ve done is build,” says Gummow. “Four years ago we added a horse show and built on that. New for this year was the ranch rodeo and barrel racing. We don’t plan on adding any new events next year. We’ll enhance what we already have.”
And that should be good news to the patrons who demonstrated through their applause they enjoyed all aspects of this years event.