Camp Drafting - Charters Towers 2001

[Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] I first started or became interested in camp laughing and back when I was about 13 so some time ago you know I was a late starter compared with a lot of other people that I'd sort of been riding and when I was very young but I hadn't been because we were on a small property I hadn't been involved in much working really working cattle with horses and when I first came in North Queensland I got on two different type of horses and had to learn to ride a bit better and not sort of thing and then I guess I was lucky enough there were some very good horses good stock horses on timber [Music] [Music] when I started riding horses that were naturally good Stoppers as I found and I really enjoyed working cattle with them and I I guess I discovered a a bit of a talent for the working cattle and so the next step was starting to build a better camp tough and I gradually got a bit and it involved in I found I enjoyed and kept going and I really enjoy working with horses in the competition and that sort of sense and and enjoy the interaction [Music] [Music] campdrafting a unique Australian horse sport I don't think except if any sort of anything like it anywhere else in the world and it originated in the way that people work cattle in Australia holding large mobs without fences and separating out the cattle they wanted out of the mob and people being competitive the way they started saying my horse is better than yours and so they have a competition to see here disappear and it developed into a more organized sport I beers and eventually formalize the rules and now it's it's a very big war and it's basically just doing the same sort of thing with horses you're getting those horses that are best at working cattle and going up in competing doing that placing pedal round on the weekend [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] the the stock we are breeding and selling becoming fairly well now and I guess within a respected area in that I don't have traveled so much out of North Queensland but within North Queensland see it pretty well now and now and particularly with the progeny of the black trees the stallion reward there's a lot of them starting to do well and here people know him pretty well [Music] it's one of the benefits we get from competing in camped up is that we breed themselves a lot of horses and so if our horses see well I'm starting my own ones or ones we sold and that helps us sell more beauty [Music] [Music] so the competitors in camp rafting it's a family sport all members of the family can compete like something like children as young as four or five and start competing and ride up to them as long as you want to keep going I know some people up into this 70s or late 60s and 70s to counter the spectators are niceties of people to buy the no family members or friends or other people who are interested in camp talking but basically nice to spectators of people that have involved in the school [Music] chem trapping is not not a very professional support in that done very few people can make money out of hemp carp and so it's still obvious basically it an amateur sport in in in feeling the the best camp doctors are still very ready to help newcomers of the sport and to help you know top them learn how to put how to do it better the other other big attractions of people starting out in the sport of camp ducting is that if you you can get a horse that you're using in your own work and home and go on weekends and with a bit of luck and you can beat the best camp suppers on a day because with the sort of variables that you have when you're chasing cattle the top qualities can have a bad day and you can have a good day and you can win a camper [Music] [Music] to describe a run a camp that run and start to finish first of all if they do it George just say the order you run in the competitors running when your turn comes you go into the yard and look at the cattle and try and decide with the benefit of some experience which one you think will be most cooperative I guess the best way to describe it so then you try and separate that one from the other cattle as quietly as possible get it on its own and take it up towards the front of the yard and show the judge how well your horse can hold that beast up as close to the front of the yard if you can then you pull the gate men to open the gate let you out into the arena and then you've got dung to pigs first in the second Pig which you have to put the beast down in a figure of eight and then take it back back further away and put it back between two pegs which is called the gate and the best-run or the higher scoring run is one that is fairly neat and fast and where you put the Beast is close to each Pig as you can and so if you can do that successfully you'll get a good score [Music] [Music] [Music] in between runs where you can prod quite often have two or three hours or half a day between time to actually driving don't talk to people that you know friends and talk about horses camp it makes me have a drink down then you need look after the horses and just it's it's a very relaxed I find it's a very relaxed sport because a social event you meet people a lot of people of interesting the same things you are and you've got time to talk with them and done and that sort of thing [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] I enjoy it because it's something I'm good at or family for that and I enjoy working the horses and cattle and it's a good it's a good smaller paper a good social thing and George I help you know that we sell [Music] sort of a number expected basically because I'm doing [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] the nice pleasure on satisfaction I get is invading a horse and training it and then going out and competing on it's been doing well I guess a couple of their outstanding ones in my mind we're with the horse I bought the stallion on walk and he was he's probably one of the been one of the best well he'd be the best camp that horse I've ever ridden and one of the best around in his climb and I guess the good thing about that was that I'd bought in and I'd bought him because I wanted a to breed more good horses and that's turned out well and I've competed successfully with his progeny and that's that so that's been a great satisfaction yes riding that stallion in a couple of the darts he he competed in he was so responsive and so easy to ride that it was just to ride in any every time you got on him and he went a number of hemp car and then competing on one of his progeny when I won the Gold Cup here last year each other tales just probably the next bit [Music] I feel I'd be competitive for quite some time yet while I'm still enjoying it and still am physically healthy enough I guess if I stop get to the stage with VF it doesn't get through and I risk and the reward No [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] my mother has had a very big influence in me my life and along a lot of plays and has always been very supportive of whatever we've done I don't know whether she's always agreed with it but she's always supported us and I think the main one of the big thing that she did for all their family was introduced to book at an early age and foster the love of reading yes and yeah apart from that it just been a great support to us all on the right mother [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music]

Channel: steadi smitty

Views: 2,380

Rating: 4.3846154 out of 5

Keywords: Ernest Bassingthwaighte, camp draft, Chater Towers, horses, competition

Id: EVJ0-tFjGP8

Length: 26min 56sec (1616 seconds)

Published: Wed Dec 26 2018