| 2018-08-22 |    |
Gimmer Shearlings in Demand at CCM Skipton Highlight
The traditional pipeopener to Skipton Auction Mart’s 2018 breeding sheep season, the Great Annual Prize Sale of Gimmer Shearlings, attracted a turnout of 3,480 head. (Tues, Aug 21)
Continental sired-sheep were a sharp trade and well in front of most vendors’ expectations, with strong framed, clean headed sheep finding a very strong enquiry from the ringside, and the section average showing a rise on the year. The whole sale saw an average for all breeds that was just £6.03 down on the year to stand at £124.08 per head
Peter Fox is pictured right with his champion pen of Mule gimmer shearlings receiving the Edgar Boothman Memorial Trophy from judge Ian Edmondson.
Trade for Mules was very much as expected and anything with a bit more power commanded prices of £130 to £170, with a few show-type pens selling from £180 to a day’s top of £225 for the second prize winners from 2016 victors, John and Beth Greenhalgh, and their daughter Anne, from Rugglesmere Farm, Bashall Eaves, Clitheroe. They joined show judge Ian Edmondson, of Ulverston.
These were closely followed at £220 by the third prize pen from brothers Will, James and Tommy Hall, of Darnbrook Farm, Darnbrook, who also sold a second pen at £200, as did 2017 victor James Towler, of Steelands Farm, Grindleton.
Also hitting £200 and again selling to the judge was this year’s champion pen of ten Mules from brothers Peter, Edward and Robert Fox, who trade as Fox Farms at Hill View Farm, Withgill, Clitheroe, and received the Edgar Boothman Memorial Trophy, again presented by his nephew Thomas Boothman, of Linton.
The Fox family continues to source gimmer lambs at the annual North of England Mule Sheep Association sales each autumn, before lambing them. Some are retained in the flock, which currently stands at 150-strong, while others return to NEMSA’s autumn ewe lamb sales.
Generally, a nice working sheep could be bought in the £120s and teens, though smaller sheep or those lacking a bit of shine proved hard to place at times during the day.
Masham sheep were keenly contested, with numbers short of buyers’ requirements and the overall average for these stood at £124 per head, £6 down on the year.
The Masham show class was won for the first time by Mark and Susan Harrison, who trade as V Verity & Son at Whitmoor Farm, West End, with a home-bred pen of ten all by a Liddle tup. They currently keep around 70 to 80 Mashams, along with some 100 Dalesbred and 150 Swaledale sheep, as well as milking 60 dairy cows.
Their class victors topped the breed prices at £138 per head when joining Luke Mellin in Bracewell, with the second prize pen, also from the Hall family, making £135, and the third prize winners from KA Liddle, of Slaidburn, £125.
For the third year in succession, the Continental show class was won by another pen of ten near pure-bred Texels consigned by Lambert and Joy Coverdale and their son, also Lambert, from Crimple Meadow Farm, Beckwithshaw. As in 2017, all were home-bred by a ram from David Towell’s Moor Top flock at Upper Leys Farm, Glusburn Moor, and they went on to sell for £170 each to Owen Chapman, of Skyreholme.
The Coverdales also stepped up with the third prize Continental pen, sold at £160, with the class runners-up, which formed part of the annual consignment from Norfolk breeders Henry Harvey & Son, of Waxham Hall, Waxham, selling for £140. Texels topped at £190 from a pen from T Jackson & Son of Goosnargh.
Individual breed averages were:
Mule £121.58 (-£13.99)
Masham
£127.51 (-£10.05)
Texel £135.01 (+£11.13)
Suffolk £113.38 (-£1.09)
Cheviot Mule £130 (+£15.20)
Beltex S£ £114.50 (-£3.71)
Zwartable
£122 (+£2.00)
Romney x £98.52.
Show classes were sponsored by the British Wool Marketing Board.
