| 2016-05-31 |    |
Bland Hat-trick at Skipton Breeding Sheep Show
Skipton Auction Mart’s late season bank holiday show and sale of ewes with lambs at foot produced a notable hat-trick in the hill lamb section for Derbyshire showman, John Bland, who landed the Swaledale ewe and single lamb show class for the third year in succession. (Mon, May 30)
Mr Bland, of Crowden House Farm, Crowden, again took the red rosette home with his home-bred ewe and Mule lamb, got by a ram from Richard Saxon, who works on the same farm and has his own Blue Faced Leicester flock. The outfit sold for £200 to east coast buyer Mike Allen, of Staithes.
John Bland, with his four-year-old son, George, and their red rosette-winning Swaledale ewe and her lamb.
Represented with nine sheep and ten lambs, Mr Bland also saw his broken mouth Swaledale ewes with twin Mule lambs sell to a top of £220 per outfit to Robert Tarbatt on Darwen, Blackburn.
Jonathan Townley, of Nutta Farm, Clapham, a regular prize winner with his cattle at Skipton, swapped codes on this occasion to clinch first place in the lowland show class with his correct Beltex-cross-Texel ewe with single Beltex lamb at foot. The duo sold away at £200 to Barnoldswick’s Geoff Carr.
Mr Townley also progressed to achieve the day’s leading price of £225 per outfit for his correct Texel-cross ewes with twin lambs. These joined local buyer Ian Bell in Carleton.
Richard Stockdale, of Oat Croft Farm, Burnsall, won the pen of hoggs with lambs at foot show class with his five Texel-cross, all with single Charollais-cross-Beltex lambs by a ram acquired at Skipton last October at the annual multi-breed sheep highlight. They sold at £185 per outfit to Frankland Farms in Rathmell, though Mr Stockdale’s run peaked at £190 for another outfit claimed by the Bowker family in Earby.
Also catching the eye was Robert Johnson, of Summerfield Farm, Felliscliffe, Harrogate, who hit £175 per outfit on two occasions with his Mules hoggs with lambs. Both fell to the same buyer, Frank Marrison, from Derbyshire’s Hope Valley.
The increased bank holiday turnout of 563 breeding sheep included 224 ewes with 327 lambs at foot, which sold to a packed ringside of customers. Good young sheep met a sharp trade and were dearer on the week, while, with grass more plentiful, older sheep maintained recent good prices. The show was well supported and the classes for singles created some of the top prices on the day.
The same day’s turnout of 1,518 prime sheep included a larger entry of 760 Spring lambs, which met a nice trade generally, with smart lambs easily achieving the previous week’s rates, though commercial lambs were cheaper on the week by around 5p-10p/kg.The overall selling average was £82.51 per head, or 203.2 p/kg.
Regular high price achiever Robert Towers, of Camp House Farm, Farleton, Lancaster, was again on the mark when producing a by-weight top of 280p/kg with his Texels, while Dave Grassam, of Stockeld Park, Wetherby, had the top price per head of £117, again with Texels.
Also penned for sale were over 400 prime and light hoggs, which were a shade dearer on the week when averaging £69.61, or 159.2p/kg overall, with some strong runs of fed hoggs still gaining a premium.
Messrs Atkinson, of Felliscliffe, produced a solid run of 150 Continental hoggs that were nicely sold, also offering two hoggs for sale in aid of Sue Ryder Manorlands in Oxenhope, which were generously purchased at £115, or 273.8p/kg, by M Alam, on behalf of Lancashire Direct Halal Meat in Blackburn.
Mature hoggs, 59 in total, sold to an overall average of £67.29 per head or 135.9p/kg, while an additional 292 cull ewes and cast rams saw the former average £54.54 per head, with a high of £113.50 per head for a Texel pen from Mike Allen, of Staithes. Rams averaged £60.50 each.
In the breeding sheep section, the entry of 447 head, comprising 170 ewes with 258 lambs at foot, represented an improved late season showing, which proved of considerable interest to a larger ringside of customers.
Megan Thomas, of Cowling, topped the sale at £225 with her Zwartble-cross gimmer hogg with Blue Texel-cross gimmer lamb at foot, which sold to the Greensit family in Ripon. Richard Stockdale, of Burnsall, also sold two pens of Texel hoggs with single lambs at £185 per outfit.
