Mrs Robinson (79) has been secretary of the Milton Utility Poultry & Bird Fanciers Club for the past 15 years, taking over after her late husband and former keen bird breeder and long-serving club secretary Robbie Robinson died.
And she has been attending club meetings and bird shows since she met Mr Robinson during a memorable holiday at the Alexandra camping ground about 1955. They were married two years later, when she was 19. She has been a bird fancier for about 60 years, and throughout that time has helped with the cooking, cake-making and overall catering for the annual Milton Poultry Show.
She was back in action, as usual, at the Coronation Hall in Union St, during the latest show at the weekend. The show attracted about 500 birds, large and small, and also plenty of other two-legged visitors without feathers.
Winners of the trophy for best best poultry overall this year were Clinton and Barbara O’Brien, of Oamaru.
These days Mrs Robinson is legally blind in one eye, and uses a crutch when she walks.
But it will take a great deal more than that to keep her away from a poultry show run by a club which helped introduce her to a network of good friends and acquaintances throughout the lower half of the South Island.
"You can’t just sit in the corner and vegetate."
The recently-released New Zealand documentary Pecking Order focuses on members of the Christchurch Poultry, Bantam and Pigeon Club as they prepare for the National Poultry Show in Oamaru in 2015.
Mrs Robinson said that most members of the Milton club had seen and enjoyed the "really good" film, which depicts not only the hopes and aspirations of bird club members but also some fierce rivalries and infighting.
Some highly competitive breeders can end up in a flutter if they miss the top perch, and find it hard to gracefully fold their wings if they’ve fallen short at a big show.
Over the years, she has won quite a few South Island and national titles, but also knows how to accept disappointment, and move on.
"You’ve just got to keep going.
"I’ve got enough grey hairs without that."
