All the fun of the fair

St. Vital

Royalwood

Wolseley

It’s nearly time for St. Vital Agricultural Society’s fair and display, the long-standing organization’s flagship annual event.

This year’s event — the 115th edition — will be held at St. Vital Centennial Arena (580 St. Anne’s Rd.) on Friday, Aug. 7 from 2:30 to 8:30 p.m. and Saturday, Aug. 8 from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Once again, the event provides members with chance to take part in judged competitions — and prizes, plaudits, and the satisfaction of a job well done — in time-honoured areas such as vegetables, fruit, preserves, baking, flower arranging, handicrafts, and painting. There will also be digital photography and junior gardening competitions.

Significantly, organizers have also started an overhaul of different categories, which will be implemented in the coming years, said the society’s president Pamela McFarlane. Examples are folk art and woodcarving. This reflects a number of things, including the changing demographics in the province, which is also reflected in the society’s membership.

As well, because longtime events follow a natural, cyclical path, veteran competition judges have retired or passed away, so the society has spent lots of time focusing on judging clinics and meeting with different societies and delivering workshops. Collaborators have included the Manitoba Association of Agricultural Societies and the Manitoba Horticultural Association.

“Anyone interested in entering the junior gardening competition doesn’t have to have a garden in St. Vital,” explained McFarlane, who lives in Wolseley, noting the judges will also visit where the entrant gardens, rather than the entrant having to transport samples of their green-thumbed handiwork to the judges.

A big outreach initiative of the society is its community gardens — the Sesquicentennial Community Garden and the Manitoba 150 and Pollinator Garden — which are located close to Abinojii Mikanah and St. Mary’s Road, and have become established fixtures in the gardening community in the last decade.

“We’ve had extensive theft at the gardens, so we’ve needed to put up a chain link fence, and add a few raised beds to help gardeners with mobility challenges and to replace trees and pollinator plants in our gardens,” McFarlane said.

She’s grateful for community funding for the fencing from Coun. Brian Mayes (St. Vital), and a community grant from Assiniboine Credit Union for the replacement trees and plants.

Wendy Balley, the society’s garden manager, said during the time the community gardens grown, so have the connections among those who use them.

“We see the same people, and they ask about each other’s lives, how things are going, what they’ve planted,” said Balley, who lives in Royalwood. “The last couple of years have been so dry, so we’ve seen some people out watering every day. The gardens have created a sense of community.”

Balley said there are 23 plots in one garden and 22 in the other; 35 are full-size (20-by-20 feet) and 10 are half-size (20-by-10 feet).

Anyone interested in taking on a plot must be a paid-up society member, pay a plot fee, and sign an agreement.

“My garden feeds three families, which gives me a deep-seated feeling inside. You start off in the coldness of March, and then your seed germinates and there’s a sense of achievement,” Balley said.

The fair and display lineup includes a seniors’ afternoon with light refreshments provided by Meadowood Seniors, and gardening, flower arranging, craft and woodcarving demonstrations on Aug. 7; and a pancake breakfast and hot dog lunch provided by the Winnipeg South Lions, and a farmers’/crafters’ market, on Aug. 8.

Admission is $5 cash for the two days. Children 16 and under can get in free with an adult, and the seniors’ afternoon on Friday costs $3.

Visit svas.ca for more information.