HARRISON and Hetherington's farmstock division has seen a turnover of £3.25m over six days in both cattle and sheep in one of the busiest weeks of the auction company's sales calendar.
With three special store sales, including the regular weekly sales, 5,200 head of cattle changed hands at Borderway Mart, Carlisle, between Monday and Saturday last week.
The highlight of the week was the annual two-day sale of suckled calves on Friday and Saturday when 1,164 steers averaged £503 and 1,240 heifers averaged £401 for heifers, prices similar to last year. The top price, £1,600, was paid by Mr S Sellers, Derby for a Limousin X heifer from Mr Stephen Graham, of Gilsland, bred by Messrs Brendan and Brian Atkinson of Plumpton, Penrith, The bullock champion, a six-month-old Charolais X from Mr Willie Weatherson, Haltwhistle, made £900 to Mr J Madeley, Ross-on-Wye.
"The increasing throughput and growing number of fixtures on our sales calendar highlights the strength of H&H's marketing position for all types of stock," said farmstock division general manager, Mr David Pritchard. The special store sales began with Wednesday's continental store sale, with a catalogued entry of 1,328 and averages up on the year at £504 for steers and £382 for heifers. On Friday almost 100 pedigree Limousin cattle were sold for four different sellers, with a top price of £3,000 paid twice for lots from Steadman and Judy Dodd, Temple Sowerby, who were reducing their herd.
Massive sheep entries during the week included a record number of Lleyns forward for the show and sale on Wednesday and Thursday. Rams hit a high of 1,300gns from AW Davies, Pwllheli, selling to Mr John Morton, Kirkland, Penrith, with eight lots making 1,000gns and more and commercial shearling gimmers selling to £120.
On Saturday the late autumn sale of Texels saw both top prices of 3,000gns and 2,000gns for gimmer shearlings from Mr Brian MacTaggart, Palnackie, Castle Douglas. Earlier in the week the annual sale of horned sheep saw averages up mainly owing to a strengthening in prices in the prime sheep sector
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