Brown back-to-back Beltex title win at Skipton A second successive monthly prime lamb championship was clinched by well-known North Yorkshire Beltex sheep breeders, husband and wife Martin and Val Brown, at Skipton Auction Mart’s March fixture. (Mon, March 2) The Browns, from Beechwood House Farm, Newton-le-Willows, Bedale, again consigned the first prize pen of five Continental-cross lambs, which, like their February title winners, were home-bred, near pure-bred Beltex. Weighing in at 41kg, they sold for the day’s high of £135 per head, or 329.3p/kg, to regular wholesale buyers Vivers Scotlamb, of Annan.

Last Store Lamb Sale of the Season First Sale of Ewes with Lambs at Foot On Monday 2nd March. Sale 12.00noon. Lingfield Ring. (Entries inc 20 Tex/Suff/Mule & Jan Born Lambs, 10 Mule/Cont Ewes & Lambs, 6 Cont/Mule Ewes & Lambs) Catalogue will be available online on Friday lunch time prior to Monday sale – please advise office of entries.

MARKET REPORT – MONDAY 23rd FEBRUARY 2015 - Forward: 56 Prime cattle comprising 4 Clean Cattle (under 30 mos), 1 Clean Cattle (over 30 mos) & 51 Cast Cattle. 2,618 Prime Sheep comprising 2,246 Prime & Lightweight Hoggs, 360 Cast Ewes & 12 Cast Rams. 51 Rearing Calves. 24 Dairy Cattle. 21 Loads of produce. Sheep numbers remain strong with feeders now getting into gear and presenting good types. The best again stretching top side of £3 per kilo, but it was the commercial types and hill lambs that were far better to sell this week, Mule lambs averaging 184.9p. Well presented lambs if clean, belly clipped and farm assured can command a good premium regardless of type.

51 Rearing Calves & 24 Dairy Cattle - Rearing Calves to £440 B&W av £115 Cont av £343 Native av £170 Calves were a strong trade today with black and whites a serious price with an average of £115 with some cracking sorts from the likes of John Blackwell and Ralph Guy making strong money at £130 and £120 but Graham Hayton topped with a 9 wk Friesian at £240. British Blues could march easily into the £400’s and topping £440 for Church Farm Enterprises with bulls averaging £360. Limousin’s would be the straightest price on the day with 5 averaging in the late £280’s with calves only 4-5 weeks old.

FORTNIGHTLY SALE OF YOUNG FEEDING BULLS, STORE BULLOCKS & HEIFERS, BREEDING CATTLE FORWARD: 748 HEAD OF CATTLE Comprising: 233 Young Feeding Bulls, 508 Bullocks & Heifers, 4 Breeding Cattle & 3 Grazing Cows.

MARKET REPORT – MONDAY 16th FEBRUARY 2015 - Forward: 24 Prime cattle comprising 24 Cast Cattle. 2,589 Prime Sheep comprising 2,167 Prime & Lightweight Hoggs, 398 Cast Ewes & 25 Rams. 36 Rearing Calves. 17 Loads of produce. A tremendous show of Beltex lambs today saw 7 pens sell in excess of 300p, tops from Paul Simpson of Bolton by Bowland whose 36kg lambs stole the show at £124 per head, with a top price per head of £129 each for 43kg’s. Paul’s trailer full of 63 lambs averaging 39.8kg, 283.8pkg or £113.17 in money. Stephen Pepper also had some smart sorts with 36kg at £114 or 318.9p and sold others to a high of £125. The Beltex breed averaged £101.60 per head or 253.6p. Texel and other continental lambs saw better finished types around 200p, commercial type’s 185p-190p. Mule lambs easily up kept last week’s rates with 44kg to 46kg keenly contested. Lightweight Horned lambs were a just a shade harder to cash on the week. Cast Sheep were a sharp trade on the week, especially the best end.

MARKET REPORT – SATURDAY 14th FEBRUARY 2015 Forward – 120 Cattle & 30 Sheep & Goats

North Yorkshire’s John Bell rung up yet another top price success at Skipton Auction Mart’s opening 2015 working sheep dogs sale with an outstanding young black and white bitch with impeccable breeding credentials that sold for 4,500gns (£4,725).

Fortnightly Sale of Store Lambs and Inlamb Ewes. Forward: 1,065 Head - Comp 730 Store Lambs (av £60.55), 334 Inlamb Ewes (av £120.31). Numbers of store lambs were still good for the time of year and a sharp trade as well with probably a better selection of lowland lambs than at the previous sale and with a lower percentage of Horned lambs this helped to push the overall average above £60. A nice entry of in lamb breeding ewes were mainly made up of a dispersal held on behalf of FE Coy & Son of Rotherham. These sheep were in fine fettle and created a great amount of interest locally and from further afield.

Craven Dairy Auction (8 head) A very small show of dairy cows with a number of vendors not forward, however those that did roll up were well supported with all newly calven heifers averaging a respectable £1671 with a number of buyers going away empty handed. 1st Prize went to a sweet heifer to Father and Son team from Church Farm Enterprises, Fred and Mark. Senterprise Fidelity Greta, a home bred pedigree heifer calved 21days and giving 31kg sold for £2,000 to Alf and Andrew Townsend. John Robinson from Harmby had the second top price on his debut with a fine home bred red heifer giving 30kg and making a strong price of £1980. Tony Swires had the third and Second prize heifers, both big smart dark heifers reaching £1920 to the Sowray Brothers of Bishop Thornton.

Forward: 47 Prime Cattle comprising 1 Clean Cattle (under 30 mos), 2 Clean Cattle (over 30 mos) & 44 Cast Cattle. 3,351 Prime Sheep comprising 3,021 Prime & Lightweight Hoggs, 330 Cast Ewes & Rams. 45 Rearing Calves. 8 Dairy Cattle. 13 Loads of produce. Another busy weekly market was held today with a solid trade seen for each class of stock. Cast Cattle were generally a good show for quality, but the improvement in trade saw the overall average nudge above 120p/kg. In the sheep ring trade was just a shade stronger on the week, with 188p being the average right across the board. Rearing calves and dairy cattle, although slightly short of numbers were all keenly contested and trade would be in front of many vendors expectations on the day.

Fortnightly Sale of Young Feeding Bulls, Store Bullocks & Heifers, Breeding Cattle Forward: 861 head of cattle - Comprising: 287 Young Feeding Bulls, 555 Bullocks & Heifers, 1 Feeding Cow, 18 Breeding Cattle. At CCM Auctions fortnightly cattle sale there was another tremendous entry of quality cattle, 842 head were sold in the store ring with nearly 300 head of suckler bred young bulls and 555 strong store cattle together with a nice selection of yearling stores in the entry. The averages show the quality on offer, but of note were several pens, especially in the pens of 3 or more heifers, which saw John Brewer sell a pen of 4 Limousin Heifers at £1500 each and The Mason family of Appletreewick bring their annual consignment of heifers which sold to £1350 for a pen of 6 Charolais cross. At the younger end Seth Blakey of Bolton by Bowland sold a lovely pen of 5 Charolais cross bullocks 10 months old for £1020 per head. The 555 Bullocks & Heifers on offer averaged £1022.33, mixed in here were 187 Limousin Heifers that averaged £1047.59, 56 Charolais Heifers at £1076.79 and 93 Limousin Bullocks average £1122.85.

Forward: 43 Prime cattle; comprising 13 Clean Cattle (under 30 mos), 2 Clean Cattle (over 30 mos) & 28 Cast Cattle. 2,885 Prime Sheep comprising 2,666 Prime Hoggs, 201 Cast Ewes & 18 Cast Rams. 52 Rearing Calves. 16 Loads of produce. Paul Baines of Trawden lead the way at the February Primestock Show taking both Champion and Reserve. His Champion a 540kg British Blue Heifer was picked up by Keelham Farm Shop of Thornton for 269.5p/kg or £1455. The reserve a Limousin cross heifer made 239.5p/kg or £1257 when selling to Simon Duerden of Blacko. The monthly lamb show was kindly judged by Mr Jim Holden, Livestock buyer for Woodhead Bros of Colne. His choice of champion pen was a pen of 5 Beltex crosses from Martin Brown of Bedale, weighing 42kg they sold for £125 each to Vivers Scotlamb, Annan.

Fortnightly Catalogue Sale of Store Lambs & Breeding Sheep. Forward: 1,411 Head comp: 1,367 Store Hoggs, 29 Inlamb Ewes, 15 Registered Blue Faced Leicesters. A large entry of store sheep for the time of year averaged £55.61 per head. Not many strong lambs on offer, best Lowland lambs to mid 70’s, best Mule also above £70, medium lambs in the £60’s and smaller lambs £50 to £55. In the entry were 450 Swaledale and Dalesbred lambs and these sold nicely away given the quality on offer.

CCM Auctions held their Mid Winter Sale of Blue Faced Leicester Females at Skipton on Wednesday. The Smearsett flock of The Booth Family of Old Hall Farm, Feizor were awarded the champion sheep prize by todays judge, Mr Thomas Walker of Appletreewick. The prize award was won by the first gimmer hogg out of their pen, sired by Gragareth E1 from David Lawson, and out of a ewe family containing a £12,000 ram sold to Marriforth, it found a new home at £500 in Ayrshire with Hugh Mongomerie. The same buyer also snapped up the highest priced sheep on the day, on this occasion from John Mason, Oddacres. A gimmer hogg by his John Park sire it sold for £580. Messrs Booth also made £500 of the third prize ewe, sired by Shafthill C1 and sold carrying triplets to a Mereoak lamb purchased in Hawes last Autumn, it sold to Kevin Wilson of Blubberhouses. Overall there was an 80% clearance rate.