FOR the second year in succession Pembrokeshire will act as host to the All Wales Ploughing and Hedging championships in September.

This will be the 56th year for this highly prestigious event to take place and the ploughing classes will be held on land at Paskeston Farm, Cosheston, near Pembroke Dock on land generously made available by David and Hugh James and family of Langdon Mill, Kilgetty. The hedging classes will be located a short distance away at Upton Farm.

The date to take note of is Saturday, September 26, with a traditional Blessing of the Plough service at the local parish church on the previous evening.

Entries have now closed and it is confirmed that there will be 91 competitors from as far afield as Yorkshire and Cornwall in the nine conventional, reversible, high cut and vintage hydraulic and trailed ploughing classes and a further four teams in the horse ploughing divisions.

Thirteen individual craftsmen will use their best skills in hedge-laying and three pairs are to take part in the wire fencing challenge.

The roots and crops schedule has twenty classes for farm and garden produce and additional interest will be provided by five local machinery dealers who will be putting on practical working demonstrations of some of the most up to date machinery available today.

At the end of the day the two Welsh qualifiers to compete in the 2016 World championships on a 500 acre site at Crockey Hill, near York will be announced. The World Ploughing Contest is held in a different part of the world each year and the last time it was in the UK was in 2000 when the event was held in Lincolnshire.

During World Ploughing 2016 the organisers, The Society of Ploughmen, will be hosting ploughmen and judges from more than thirty countries, including from as far away as the USA, Kenya, Australia and New Zealand.

The huge costs of staging the event is being raised by local ploughing societies, by private donations, and through sponsorship.

The Welsh championships have been held in Pembrokeshire on 12 previous occasions and the county has produced the champion ploughman no less than eight times.

For this months major attraction, inspired by a hardworking team headed by George John and Richard Prout, chairman and vice-chairman and Gordon Harries, secretary, a range of very well supported fund raising events have already taken place and these funds have been handsomely boosted by a truly remarkable measure of sponsorship.

It is anticipated that there will also be a very good attendance for the Blessing of the Plough service at St Mary’s Church, Carew Cheriton, at 7pm on Friday, September 25, which will be conducted by the vicar, Rev Carolyn Wood, and is expected to include contributions from soloists, Ray Hughes and Joy Cornock.

The match site will be well signposted on the A477 major road three miles east of Pembroke Dock (sat nav SA72 4SE).