Many headline entertainers are scheduled to perform at the Strawberry Festival on the Wish Farms Soundstage. But scattered throughout the Festival are smaller venues packed with highly enjoyable talent. These shows are included in with the ticket prices, and give visitors a lot more bang for the buck. The following acts are some of the ones the Festival has brought in for guests.
Robinsons Racing Pigs have been entertaining fair and festival goers for over 40 years. After appearances on The Tonight Show with both Johnny Carson and Jay Leno, this show became a staple for festivals and fairs around the country, and bills itself as the number one fair attraction in North America. Several celebrities compete in the show including Arnold Schwarzenhogger, Justin Bieberque, and Taylor Not-So-Swift.
Veranica Tchalabaeva is a third-generation performer and animal trainer. She has grown up traveling the United States with her parents, who perform trick horse riding. The 15-year-old has her own show with dogs, Veranica & Her Amazing Friends. “I have been training dogs for around four years now. I started off because I always loved dogs since I was little. But it was mostly my mom’s idea. My mom wanted to train the dogs herself. But she ended up having me try it first. Me and the pups had such an amazing bond together that I just loved it, and wanted to keep doing it.” Veranica appeared on America’s Got Talent in 2022 and made it to the semi-finals of the competition. “It was very exciting, but very nerve-wracking,” she said. “My palms were sweating the whole hour before. I was nervous, but once I got on stage, everything kind of blacked out and there was just the connection between me and my dogs.”
Circus Incredible features a Wallenda, and second-generation Russian performer. Lyric Wallenda, seventh generation of the world-famous Wallendas, is an aerial performer. Lyric’s trapeze act reaches heights of 30 feet. The other performer, Simon Arestov, offers crowds a barely possible balancing act.
Debbie Obarka is the host for SQUAWK! The Amazing Birdshow. Among other things, her birds can talk, shop for vegetables using a tiny cart, put together a puzzle, and create paintings that often look like birds (and are for sale). During the summer, they perform daily at a park in Kansas City. “I started way back in the 1980s working with birds at Busch Gardens Tampa,” she said. “In 1985, I was given the blue and gold that does the most in our show, Roxie, by someone who didn’t want a wild-caught parrot. He didn’t know what he had gotten himself into. Then she wouldn’t even step on an arm. Now she does the most things in the show. But she is an amazing bird. People began giving me birds. People didn’t want them. I can train, so I trained them….I raised Rusty, and little Danny, and Mr. Presley, but I like to tell people I don’t raise parrots anymore because the nursing is too painful….People get them, especially when they are hand-fed babies, and they think that bird is going to stay like that, but they change, and people start getting rid of them. So, four out of eight of my birds were given away by people who didn’t want them. There are rescues all over the State of Florida. At rescues you can get a nice bird that just needs a home.”
These acts last 20 to 30 minutes, and provide a lot of fun to full stands of cheering, laughing audiences.