Towler Continentals win CCM Skipton prime lambs title
James Towler, of Steelands Farm Grindleton, was champion at Skipton Auction Mart’s monthly prime lamb show on Monday, February 5, with a pen of five home-bred 41kg Beltex-cross.
All in the title-winning pen were by a pure-bred ram acquired at last September’s main pedigree Beltex highlight at Skipton from Durham breeder Henry Jewitt. They sold for £114 each to regular Red Rose butcher buyer Hamlets, of Garstang.
Airton’s Michael Hall was runner-up in the Continental show class with a 42kg Beltex-cross pen, also nominated as reserve champions by judge James Dewhurst, of Winterburn, and selling for £107 per head to Vivers Scotlamb in Annan.
However, it was the third placed 47kg Beltex pen from January reserve champions EP&JM Hutchinson, of Faceby in Hambleton, that did best of the prize winners when knocked down at £118 each to Countrystyle Meats Farm Shop in Lancaster.
There were higher prices outside the show classes, with Andrew Phillips, of Burton Leonard, leading the way with a £126 per head Beltex pen claimed by Thomas Shepherdson, of Slaithwaite, also selling others at £120 and £117.
Henry Atkinson, of Felliscliffe, Harrogate, had Beltex lambs at £126, along with the top per kilo price of 308p with 37kg Beltex bought by Vivers. A great run of Texel lambs from South Yorkshire’s Ian Marsden, of Hoylandswaine, traded to a section high of £124 per head.
Back in the show classes, the first prize pen of 48kg Suffolk-cross from D&A Livestock, of Haverah Park, Harrogate, sold for £106 per head, again to Mr Shepherdson, with the same vendor selling other pens to a section high of £118.
The red rosette-winning 48kg Mules from Newark’s Steve Dorey made £98 each to John Bowling, of Ashton-in-Makerfield, while the first prize pen of horned lambs, 41kg Swaledales from Matt Mason in Appletreewick, sold for £71 to Yorkshire Halal Meat in Keighley.
Heavy lambs again stepped up a gear, with plenty of three-figure prices and those in the 46kg to 52kg weight range averaging 209p/kg. The best Mule wethers and hill-bred lambs were 10p/kg dearer on the week, with good 43-47kg types making 195p to £2 per kilo and horned lambs selling in the 180s up to 190p/kg.
Taking into account that the increased entry of 2,815 old season lambs included 1,059 Mule, horned and other hill-breds, then the overall selling average for all lambs of £85.12 per head, or 201.7p/kg, was deemed even more remarkable.
Also penned for sale were 134 cast sheep. Cull ewe numbers were short of requirements, producing a stronger trade on the week of £63.83 per head, while cast rams averaged £70.96.