A show of top suckled calves and store cattle with a prize fund of £4000 will be a major focal point at the UK’s national beef event, Beef Expo 2007, at Skipton, Yorkshire, on Thursday, May 17.

Left to right, Beef Expo 2006 organising committee chairman Ian Watson, judge Terry Coghill and Alister Vance with his suckled calf champion, a Limousin cross heifer Sassie Lassie.

Championship awards in the National Spring Spectacular Show are being sponsored by Caltech and will include a total of £800 for the overall champion and up to £550 for the reserve, depending on class and section placings.

The 10 classes include three for Continental steers, three for Continental heifers, two for pure-bred steers and heifers and two for native bred steers and heifers.

The entry fee is £5 per entry for members of the National Beef Association and £10 for non-members. Closing date for the receipt of entries is Tuesday, April 17.

Judging will commence at 10.30 a.m. on the day and the judge will be three-times exhibitor of the supreme champion at the Royal Smithfield Show, Hugh Dunlop, Holehouse, Ochiltree, Ayrshire.

“The show was introduced for the first time at last year’s Beef Expo at Carlisle and attracted a large entry and a huge ringside audience,” said event organiser, Euan Emslie.

“We are grateful to Caltech and other sponsors for their generous support. This has created a highly attractive prize pool which should provide a real incentive to prospective exhibitors and ensure a large turn-out of cattle from throughout the UK.”

Mr Dunlop and his wife, Lynne, won the championship at Smithfield in 1996 with Am Your Man, 2002 with Lip Gloss and 2004 with Dancing Queen which sold for a record price of £16,000.

They have also won both the championship and reserve awards at the Scottish Winter Fair and in the commercial cattle classes at the Royal Highland Show and Ayr Show, as well as many championships at local shows.

Mr and Mrs Dunlop run 140 beef suckler cows, 45 pedigree Texel ewes and 100 Texel cross ewes at Holehouse, and also look after the nearby Dunlop family farm of Mill o’ Shiel, Coylton. Mr Dunlop has also had experience as a cattleman with the Rushmore Charolais and Aberdeen-Angus herds in Oxfordshire and the Cardona Aberdeen-Angus herd at Doune, Perthshire, which he managed for two years from 1998 to 2000 before Holehouse was acquired. He has judged at shows throughout the UK and Ireland, including the Scottish Winter Fair and Clogher Valley in Northern Ireland.

Beef Expo 2007 is the UK’s leading beef event organised at a different venue each year by the NBA. Venue is Skipton Auction Mart, courtesy of auctioneers, CCM. Mainline sponsors of this year’s event are CCM Skipton, EBLEX, Dugdale Nutrition, Dunbia, Intervet, Keenan, Limousin Cattle Society and Yara.

Features of Beef Expo will include a comprehensive programme of practical and livestock demonstrations, beef breed exhibits, stockjudging, seminars and trade and educational stands. The emphasis will be on performance, animal health, efficiency of production, marketing and achieving profitability without Single Farm Payment.

“Beef Expo has established itself over the last few years as the major event for the UK beef industry and is again set to attract a large attendance of producers from all over the UK and Ireland, as well as overseas,” said Mr Emslie.

“It presents the agricultural industry with a unique opportunity to present its products and services to a large and influential audience of professional beef farmers.”

On the day before Beef Expo, there will be an opportunity to visit three nearby beef farms, followed by a pre-event conference in the afternoon at Skipton Auction Mart and pre-event dinner in the evening at the Rendezvous Hotel, Skipton.

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