Tamworth Show dates move back to March for 150th celebration overlap with Barraba and Armidale

After being held in September for the past five years, the Tamworth Show will return to March next year to celebrate 150 years of the event.

The show has been penciled in to run from March 3 to March 5, overlapping with the Barraba and Armidale shows.

Barraba Show Society president David Penna said the clash was an "awkward situation" that would cause a "lot of issues".

Historically, Barraba and Armidale have always clashed, but Mr Penna said adding Tamworth Show to the mix would be a blow.

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"We get a lot of support from Tamworth people, it's going to be hard to ask people in Tamworth to support two or three shows," he said.

Mr Penna said it was already hard enough to attract cattle and sheep for judging and volunteers to keep the event running.

"It's going to hurt," he said.

For 144 years the Tamworth Show was run in March, but due to a number of annual event bookings at the Australian Equine Livestock Events Centre - after the original showground site was sold - the only available dates have been in September.

The Barraba Show attracted more than 4500 people during the three-day event this year.

Most years the show manages to offer around two major amusement park rides.

But this has dwindled since the pandemic wiped out a lot of operators and sent insurance prices "through the roof", Mr Penna said.

The Tamworth Show Society was contacted for comment.

The Barraba and Tamworth Show committees will meet on Wednesday to discuss the clash.

"We will be sitting down to discuss what we can iron out," Mr Penna said.

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