Campdrafting – Australia’s own horse sport.

I’ve enjoyed a fascinating weekend. Beginning with a dash down the Toowoomba range to an Arabian horse show at Ipswich (will blog about that later) and then off to Pittsworth to donate some copies of ‘Tails Carried High’ to the Pittsworth and District Campdraft.

Dozens of Pittsworth locals turned out to see over 700 head of cattle driven through the normally quiet streets of Pittsworth, southwest Queensland. The cattle were walked to the Pittsworth showgrounds for the Pittsworth and District Campdraft.

With more than 1000 nominations the competition will use more than 1200 cattle. There is total prize money of over $13,000, plus trophies. When speaking to the secretary I learnt there would have been up to 15 campdrafts around the district on this particular weekend. I have also heard campdrafting is growing in popularity at an amazing rate.
I wonder why Arabian horses don’t compete at campdrafting – or do they? Described as Australia’s own horse sport, campdrafting has its origins in the early days of the Australian stockman and believed to have begun in rural Queensland in the early part of the twentieth century.

When drovers needed to select individual cattle from a mob to drive them to a separate holding area, the stockman would “cut out” the beast from the mob. This was achieved through the skills of the horse and rider to block the attempts of the beast to follow his natural instincts in returning to the mob.

This was usually done when large mobs of cattle were mustered together and held by a team of horsemen on the open plain, while the nominated rider did the “cutting out”. Over time, stockmen developed competitions based around this activity, which have evolved into the uniquely Australian sport as we know it today.

The sport today is conducted in a set of yards attached to an arena and requires the competitor to “cut out” a beast from the yard or “camp”, follow it out through the open gate into the arena where he must guide the beast around a course of a right and left hand turns before guiding it through a gate, all in a few short minutes. (See diagram below)

Draft Diagram

Points are scored by horse and rider for cut out, horse work and course completion, from a possible total of 100 points. A good campdrafter is not just a fine horseman, but has the skill to select a suitable beast from the mob that will run well.

The prestige associated with a win in a campdraft of several hundred competitors is invaluable to the owner of the horse, as the winning horse is ranked amongst the finest stock horses in the country.

All photographs by Carmel Rowley

To learn more about campdrafting in your area go to Australians’ Campdraft Association website: www.campdraft.co.au