Emsworth Show

The Emsworth Show is an annual event organised by the Emsworth Horticultural Society on Bank Holiday Monday.   This is a major local event which attracts thousands of visitors.  It has a traditional horticultural marquee with competitions for flowers and vegetables, art and crafts, photography and baking.  There are also arena events, dog, show, live music and over 100 stalls, including most of the local associations and conservation groups.    The Brook Meadow Conservation Group has a stall each year manned by volunteers to publicise the meadow and the conservation work undertaken.


EMSWORTH SHOW – MONDAY 28th AUGUST  2023
Report by Colin Brotherston.  Photos by Kathy Edwards
As in previous years Brook Meadow Conservation Group  hosted a stand at the show on bank holiday Monday.  The reasons for this are to advertise our work in the local community, gain some more members and provide a place where wild life issues can be discussed and shared.
The stand was manned throughout the day by Colin, Kathy, Reg, David, Neil and Paul and extra help from Maurice and Tricia. We all had an enjoyable and interesting day and hope to be able to participate again next year.
Here are Neil, David and Colin manning the stall.  This year we had our usual plot between the two arenas and the stand enjoyed a steady trickle of visitors throughout the day. The weather was excellent being dry, partially sunny and not too hot. Reg provided the large gazebo, Maurice brought along his thumbsticks and Kathy organised the children’s  activity table.
During the day we were able to sign up four new members and collect four renewals. We also received a number of donations and sold a few leaflets and “Brook Meadow through the Ages” books.  Here is Neil looking after the sales.
The children’s activity table was particularly successful attracting participants nearly all the time. There were two activities. One involved colouring and cutting out butterflies and mounting them on clothes pages to make them flap. The second was colouring dragonflies and balancing them on fingers.  Here is David supervising a couple of young visitors cutting out butterflies.
PS  Parental permission given for photo of children. 


EMSWORTH SHOW – MONDAY  30th AUGUST  2021
It was good to see the annual Emsworth Show back on the road at the New Church site as last year’s 2020 show was cancelled due to the Covid lockdown.  As before, Jean and I along with granddaughter Lisa, caught the shuttle bus from Emsworth to the showground, which was held up by a big traffic jam on the main road caused by a large number of vehicles heading for the showground.
However, we eventually got there and found the Brook Meadow Conservation Group stall manned by several volunteers, including Debbie, David, Terry, Tony, Dan and Colin. My apologies if I missed anyone as I was only present at the show for a couple of hours. As always the stall was attractively laid out and had photographic displays of conservation work and wildlife of the meadow. Debbie had kindly brought the bucket of wild flowers from the meadow plus the list of plants.  Maurice made a selection of walking sticks each sale including free membership for a year!   Here is a selection of photos I took.

David and Terry busy with customers

Tony supervising kids activities . . . Dan’s Flora Handbook was much admired

Maurice’s walking sticks . . . Brian’s bucket of wild flowers

Lisa and Jean received Brook Meadow pencils! . . .  David and Debbie in conversation

Dan, David, Colin and Terry taking it easy in the Brook Meadow stall.  Well done, Chaps.

There were queues everywhere on the showground, including one to enter the main marquee, but it was worth the wait. A one way traffic system and a limit on numbers entering made it a pleasure to look around. The displays of fruit, vegetables, flowers and handicrafts were as usual superb!     How do they do it?
Lisa and I were particularly keen to see the photo displays as we had both submitted two entries. All four of our photos were on display, but no prizes this time!   (Lisa won the overall photo prize last time!)   My two photos were both taken on Brook Meadow using my old Lumix point and shoot camera.  The one I entered for ‘A Path’ class showed three volunteers (Juliette, Pam and Nigel) wheeling barrows along a path of wood chippings – taken during a workday on 7th March this year. The judge commented that the photo was ‘a good composition but could have been a little sharper’.  Fair enough, though it was a dull day in March and the photo was live – I never use special effects to enhance photos.
My other photo entry under ‘Any other subject’ was a picture of the air ambulance helicopter landing on Brook Meadow on the 6th August this year.   Sadly, the judge was not  impressed with this one.   I can see now that the photo does not convey the drama of noise and wind as the machine came down.  A scary experience!


EMSWORTH SHOW – MONDAY 26th AUGUST – 2019
Report by Brian Fellows and Maurice Lillie
The Brook Meadow Conservation Group had their usual stall at the Emsworth Show – this year at the New Life Church site on Thorney Road. This was an exciting new venture for the Emsworth Horticultural Society on a much larger site with plenty of car parking, but out of Emsworth. However, a 15 minute shuttle bus service was provided to and from Emsworth which lots of visitors (including myself and my wife) were pleased to make use of on such a hot day.
My main contribution was a bucket crammed with 21 species of wild flowers that I had collected earlier in the morning from Brook Meadow. I dropped off the bucket of flowers on the doorstep of Debbie Robinson who had kindly offered to take them down to the show ground. A big thank you should go the Brook Meadow volunteers who erected the stall and manned it throughout a very hot day.
Maurice Lillie has written the following report of day’s activities with a few photos from me  .
“We had a really good day. I arrived shortly after 09.00 and David, Kathy and Debbie had started to unpack the gazebo and sort out the poles. At 10.30 it was erected and furnished with tables, chairs, display board, Brook Meadow banners, Kathy’s craft table and a fabulous collection of wildflowers that Brian had collected earlier from the meadow.
Dave McVittie had brought round 11 bags of 5 recycled tennis balls that he has been collecting up, hand washed and disinfected for sale. Dan brought loads of dog poo bags too.
Lots of volunteers attended to help on the stall, Tony, Terry, Reg, Brian and his wife as well as the above. Sorry if I have missed anyone. Pam was busy treasuring, I believe Colin was on car parking duty. Dave McVittie popped by to enquire after sales of balls and I was able to tell him that 14 found new homes. Dan also sold lots of his dog poo bags. Quite a few members renewed and some generous donations received.

Maurice, Tony and David keeping cool in their different ways

The butterfly creation activity was very popular.  Here is Terry looking at the displays with a visitor
Finally, I cannot help but mention that my grandson Joe won a 1st prize for his photo of a Bumblebee feeding on Thistle flowers taken on Brook Meadow a few weeks ago.
PS – My photo of a Painted Lady sadly did not get a prize!


EMSWORTH SHOW – 27th August 2018
Report by Jennifer Rye. Photos by Brian Fellows
The day dawned grey and rather threatening, but our crack team of setters up were ahead of the game; having been asked to get there for 9 a.m., when I turned up on the dot, they’d already got the gazebo up and ready. All the constituent parts had been delivered by Pam, so thank you to her, Terry, Kathy and Debi. Augmented by the appearance of Debbie, David and Maurice, with the rest of the materials needed, we were ready for business when the show opened at 10 a.m. Here is David all ready and waiting for customers!
A steady stream of visitors to the stand all day followed. As usual, Brian’s bike with its basket full of seasonal colour from Brook Meadow parked in front of the gazebo took pride of place.
A number of people renewed their membership, made donations, and purchased bargain Christmas cards and biodegradable dog poo bags.

The photographic displays were studied by many people, and several newcomers and visitors stopped to make our acquaintance.

Most importantly, we were able to chat to like-minded conservationists, exchange information and share experiences. For example, enquirers from Hampshire Farm Group could talk bats with David, and be given contact details for the County bat recorder.
By the end of the day, we were all ready to pack everything away in half the time it took to assemble it, to get home and put our feet up.

Many, many thanks to all who helped make it a success, despite the rather disappointing weather. But at least it did not rain, not a drop!


EMSWORTH SHOW – Monday 28th August 2017
The Brook Meadow Conservation Group had their usual stall at the annual Emsworth Show on Bank Holiday Monday. It was a perfect day weather wise with non stop warm sunshine. This attracted a good attendance and the Brook Meadow stand had a good flow visitors throughout the day to look at the fine display of photos showing conservation work on the meadow and the variety of wildlife that live there.   Many people also too the opportunity to renew their subscriptions while others joined for the first time.  Here are a few photos of the stand and the people manning it.

I arrived with a basket of wild flowers picked from the meadow this morning
Thanks to Maurice for the photo
Maurice, Jennifer and David standing proudly in front of the stand

Debbie talking to visitors

David taking a member’s subscription

Jennifer discussing the work of the group with a visitor

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