Congratulations to Danny Higgins winner of the 2024 LCA Classic

Yet another year with an excellent number of high-quality Lizards on show. We had just under 200 birds benched this year despite the fact that our two judges – David Allen and Huw Evans were unable to enter any birds as they were judging the show. Unfortunately, this year, after yet another win at the National (their 4th year in a row), Rob and Ian Wright were unable to attend with their birds due to Rob being unwell. Hopefully Rob and Ian will be at the next years Classic.

Judging 200 birds takes time and for the last couple of years the judging ran until the afternoon not allowing much time for exhibitors to view all the birds benched. So, this year we decided to revise the schedule for the day. The judging started once the birds were benched when we would have otherwise had the AGM. This enabled the judging to start an hour earlier. It also provided all the show attendees the opportunity to view the birds much earlier than in previous years. We also dispensed with the raffle thus providing yet more time to view the birds. These changes to the schedule proved a real success and will be implemented for subsequent Classic shows.

We were also able to get a fast start to benching the birds this year as Noel Sidney and Alex Maclean had set up the staging the night before the show. To get nearly 200 birds on to the show bench I was again supported by Tony Horton in booking all the birds in. And with Chris Jordan, along with David and Paula Newton, putting the birds on the staging the whole process went like clockwork.

Noel Sidney once again provided all the refreshments, Andy Beesley judged the sales birds, and Alex Maclean ran the silent auction. As in previous years there were some very good Lizards that people could bid on to supplement their breeding team for next year.

The two judges faced quite a challenge in making their determination for the top awards this year and it turned out to be an excellent day for the Higgins with Danny taking Best and Third Best in Show and Nigel taking Second Best in Show. Alex Maclean took Fourth Best in Show. In the Novice/Junior colour-fed section, in what I think is his final year as a novice Ray Anthony won Best Novice along with 3rd and 4th Best Novice Awards while Mick Tiffany who is new to exhibiting Lizards won Second Best Novice.

Tony Horton is a strong supporter of the natural-coloured Lizard, and he dominated the Champion natural-coloured classes winning Best and Second Best, while the Novice/Junior natural coloured section was won by Toby Ashpole with Bob Sneddon taking Second Best.

For a number of years now we have had two highly commended awards – one for a champion and one for a novice. These awards are awarded at the discretion of the judges. This year the awards went to Noel Sidney and Ray Anthony. Noel benched an excellent over-year clear cap gold cock. Although the white tips to his flights and tail (the signs of on over year bird) meant that he was unlikely to win one of the top prizes the judges did not hesitate to award Noel with a Champion Highly Commended prize. The Novice Highly Commended Novice award went to Ray for his Lizard which won him the Best Novice award.

Once again, the show proved to be a great success, and a big thankyou goes to all those who help running the event and to the exhibitors who worked hard to get their birds to the show bench. And of course, our thanks also go to the two judges who had the challenging task of selecting the winners.