Townsville Show 2025: Cattle and poultry results
From mini goats, to champion chooks, and ‘the pigeon man’ - the Townsville Show was full of an unusual range of animals. We speak to their owners.
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From mini goats, to champion chooks, and ‘the pigeon man’ - the Townsville Show was full of an unusual range of animals.
Shanei Treffers brought her Australian miniature silkie goat ‘Mary Poppins’ to the show on Saturday as part of the Townsville and District Goat Club display.
“I started with three goats and spiralled from there,” Miss Treffers said.
“I have about 24 Australian miniature silkies now. They excel in the hobby scene, they are bred to be docile.”
The four-year-old Mary Poppins was in her element at the show, demonstrating a surprising level of confidence given it was her first ever show, and first time on a leash.
“This is a new breed that’s still in development,” Miss Treffers said of the silkies.
“In 2008 they were called the Australian mini sheltie and they got very popular. A lot of people bought them and realised they were hard to keep, and we nearly lost the breed.”
The influx of people buying up all the animals, only to abandon or give them up, created a crisis for the niche goat breed.
“In 2014 a dedicated group got together to stop them dying out,” Miss Treffers said.
“They are showing, you can spin their coat, and we are always improving them.”
King of poultry
Over in poultry land, Bluewater chicken exhibitor Grant Jolliffe was pleased when his Australorp cockerel won Champion Large Fowl and reserve champion of show.
“The Australorp is a heritage Australian bird,” Mr Jolliffe said.
“They are a utility breed, they can do meat and eggs. I’ve been raising Australorps for about eight years now and I love the challenge of a large, Aussie breed.”
Chief steward Gregg Wyer has been invovled with the Townsville Poultry and Pigeon Fanciers Club for 10 years, and said the numbers continue to be good.
“We do get a lot of people coming in here looking for backyard chickens, but these are exhibition chickens,” Mr Wyer said.
“It’s a great hobby (showing poultry), you meet lots of good people and it’s an awesome challenge to breed the best bird possible.”
The pigeon man
Someone who takes the hobby to heart is the pigeon man, Garry Weinheimer.
The Nome resident has been breeding pigeons for 50 years, and his flock of show birds is so large they take up a whole row of cages.
Being the only pigeon shower in Townsville, he was guaranteed to win champion pigeons - it was just a question of which bird it was going to be.
Ultimately, it was a Modena Gazzi cockerel that won best in show.
“Pigeons are just so easy, and they give you such relief when you are feeling stressed,” Mr Weinheimer said.
“I would absolutely recommend pigeons to anyone, they are very calming.”
No schools for Townsville cattle show
Over in the cattle ring, the herd numbers continued to stay low at just 15 participating cattle.
As the dynamics of cattle showing continue to change, the Townsville Show is often left behind because of its traditional place on the winter school holidays.
A huge majority of cattle showing these days is done by schools, but they don’t take their cattle out on the school holidays.
Crowd favourites Murray Greys and lowlines were both present on the day.
Poultry results 2025
Poultry results to be published soon.
Cattle results 2025
Cattle results to be published soon.
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Originally published as Townsville Show 2025: Cattle and poultry results
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