Hitchen ducks head pecking order at CCM Skipton autumn poultry highlight
Calderdale poultry breeder Stephen Hitchen, from Ludendenfoot, Halifax, ruled the roost when sending out the champions at the autumn Craven Premier Poultry show and sale at Skipton Auction Mart. (Saturday, September 7)
He clinched another title at the North Yorkshire venue with his first prize pen of waterfowl, a trio of 2019 Silver Appleyard ducks, which sold for £40.
Show judge Geoff Marsden, from Wetherby, himself a well-known poultry man, plucked out the first prize large fowl pen, a 22-week-old Light Sussex trio, as his reserve champions. They came from Red Rose breeder John Hindle, of Oswaldtwistle, who stood champion with a trio of White Wyandottes at the previous Spring show. His latest prize winners made £55.
Many birds of a feather flock to the seasonal poultry highlights and it was a pair of emus from Louise Clark, of Darlington, that sold for the day’s top price of £200, while a pair of three-year-old breeding rheas from Granville Fairburn, of Apperley Bridge, also sold well at £100.
Other leading prices included £85 and £65 for Welsummer pullets, £80 for Silver Laced Wyandotte pullets, the same price for another pen of Silver Appleyard ducks and £65 for Copper Black Marans. Of the accessories, a wheeled ark made £110.
The next poultry show at Skipton is the Christmas fixture on Saturday, December 14, for which entries close on December 5.