Craven Dairy Auction frontrunners sell at £2,500 and £2,450
The two top-notch principals at Skipton Auction Mart’s latest Craven Dairy Auction show and sale achieved the highest prices seen in recent memory. (Mon, July 1)
Taking top call of £2,500 was the overall champion, the first prize newly calven heifer from the Lawson family, who run the Newbirks Holstein Friesian pedigree herd in Arthington, Otley.
Their Newbirks Crest Jazz, a three weeks-calved 38-litre daughter of the home-bred stock bull, Newbirks Crest, since sold and performing well in pastures new, is out of dam from the Lawsons’ milk-rich Jazz line.
The victor was fiercely contested at the ringside, before falling to Angus Dean, of the high yielding and classified pedigree Threshfield Holstein herd at Toft House.
Show judge Shaun Sowray, of Bishop Thornton, was spot on again when his choice of reserve champion, the second prize heifer from Brian and Judith Moorhouse’s Aireburn herd at Hesper Farm, Bell Busk, went on to claim second top call of £2,450 when again falling to the Dean family.
Their Aireburn Grafeeti Dellia is a three weeks-calved 32-litre daughter of the renowned Ladies-Manor Rd Grafeeti with eight generations of VG of EX behind her.
The third prize 35-litre commercial heifer presented by Richard and Andrew Walker, of East Morton, also sold away nicely at £1,850 to regular dairy buyer Mark Goodall, of Tong, Bradford. Pedigree newly calven heifers averaged £2,042.50 and commercials £1,675.
A run of In-calf entries from two vendors saw the first prize winner, a stylish black heifer due to an Aberdeen-Angus sire at the end of July from John Roberts, of Huddersfield, knocked down for £1,520 to Will Shuttleworth in Rylstone. The section average was £1,355. The opening July dairy fixture attracted a 14-strong entry.
Straight trade for rearing calves
The same morning’s weekly sale of 42 rearing calves produced a straight trade throughout, with the best prices received for bull calves, particularly Aberdeen-Angus and British Blue – a four-and-a-half-week-old Angus from Stephen Marshall, of West End, selling at £275 and a shapely Blue from RLWright & Son, of Airton, making £410 top call of the day.
A lot of young calves showing potential made good money, producing averages of £285 for Continentals, £185 for natives and £56.15 for black and whites, which sold to a top of £135 for a bull calf from Jonathan Caygill in Rylstone.