An injection of some new members to the organising committee coincided with an addition of some new events to the program and both appear to have worked well and are likely to stay.

The seven day camp, which finished last Saturday, was attended by 74 young riders aged from two to 17 years of age.

This was well up from last year’s numbers of 40 with many attending from around the region and Sydney, through still not as high as 1998’s record of 120.

Organisers say that the reason Walcha’s camp is so popular is because it offers a wide variety of horse activities and also uses bison for the campdraft training.

Bison are slower than cattle and virtually walk through the course themselves with the children and instructor following.

The Walcha 2013 Pony Camp was a resound-ing success according to all those who attended.ers for the cattle campdraft event with Alan Laurie on day three of the camp.

Participants are then judged and scored over two runs but receive no ribbon as it is not a competition as such but practice.

A few of the new events proved popular this year.

Orienteering was developed and instructed by Simon Wall. In the sleet on Thursday, senior and junior riders donned oil skins and were taken to Sugar Loaf mountain with maps and compasses. The seniors were fairly confident but didn’t do as well as the juniors who studied the maps hard to get their bearings.

Mounted games were conducted by NSW Mounted Games coach Phil Logue who agreed to do them for Walcha at the last minute due to his tight schedule.

Horse ball with Ian Reid and the junior treasure hunt were also a hit with the participants.

All areas of horsemanship were covered: Anita Overton instructed and judged showjumping; Wainie

Robertson and Virginia Liddle instructed and judged dressage; Rob McKenna covered shoeing and Tony Donnelly instructed polocrosse; flatwork; pairs and fours; and troupe drills were all well attended too.

Jenny Hoy runs the catering pavilion kitchen with an army of helpers who feed the hungry hoards for the week.

The organising committee consisting of president Mark Mackaway; secretary Denise Watts; treasurer Sonya Green; publicity officer Cathy Mackaway and senior instructor Sharyn Swanton all agree the support and effort made by the parents and volunteers is phenomenal.

“So many people are involved and they just drop everything to dedicate themselves to the camp for the week,” Mr Mackaway said.