Forward: 69 Prime cattle comprising 23 Clean Cattle & 46 Cast Cattle 4,809 Prime Sheep comprising 4,025 Prime Lambs & 784 Cast Ewes & Rams 80 Rearing Calves 8 Dairy Cattle

Rearing Calves to £460 (80 head) Another healthy number of calves through the door today with the top price calf belonging to Hayton and Stocks of Bolton Abbey. Fred Houseman saw a flying trade with blue heifers at £450 and £440 with Hayton & Stocks seeing their strong limousin heifers reach £415 and £400. Native bulls were a premium today with the calves on offer flying away with young calves nudging the £300 mark all the time. Black and whites touch easier on the week, again a mixed show of quality hampering the average but overall a straight trade for the better end topping at £105 for a nice calf from Robert Throup of Bradley.

CCM Auctions held their Annual Special Sale of Breeding Ewes 2 Shear and older together with other sheep at Skipton on Wednesday where there was an entry of 828 sheep with additional sale day entries. There were some very good Annual Consignments of young sheep with Thomas Binns making £158 and £150 of 2 shear Mules and David Coates making £150 on three occasions also for 2 shear Mules. Some large consignments of full mouth correct Mule ewes and broken mouth ewes receiving strong interest for early lamb production, as were the stronger Suffolk and Continental cross ewes the best of which were in the £100 to £115 region.

Fortnightly Sale of Young Feeding Bulls, Store Bullocks & Heifers, Breeding Cattle. Forward: 576 head of cattle. Comprising: 66 Young Feeding Bulls, 12 Beef Feeding Cows, 490 Bullocks & Heifers, & 8 Breeding Cattle. A few 2016 Autumn born bulls coming forward which met a ready audience of bull customers looking to keep pens full and in spec. Stuart Baldwin of Bryn, near Wigan presented 7 high quality Autumn 2016 bulls to average £1133 to a top of £1210. Late Spring 2016 bulls a very good trade. Ian Pratt with Limousin crosses at 14 & 15 months at £1300 and £1290. A high proportion of Continental crosses bred from the dairy herd in both steer and heifer sections all of which were a very good trade, with suckler bred bullocks and heifers slightly scarce on the day buyers looking for smart retail types stepped on to buy their pick with trade strong throughout despite a reasonable harvest day in the east.

Forward: 56 Prime cattle comprising 15 Clean Cattle (under 30 mos), 1 Clean Cattle (over 30 mos) & 40 Cast Cattle. 3,641 Prime Sheep comprising 2,976 Prime Lambs & 665 Cast Ewes & Rams. 94 Rearing Calves.

Rearing Calves to £455 (94) 94 calves through the ring today, with a 4 month old Stirk from George and Pauline Fleetwood topping the day at £660. Fred Houseman topped the female calves at £455 for a tremendous British Blue heifer selling to regular buyers Stephen and Malcom Abbott. A run of Flekvieh calves on offer today met a strong trade with Colin Bentley of Thirsk selling the top price of £255. Natives were the most hard fought over with Michael Heron topping the bulls at £300 for a 26 day old bull and Richard Spence of Sutton in Craven topped heifers at £305 for a Angus heifer out of a Friesian.

Haggas family success at Skipton Beltex store lamb show Skipton Auction Mart’s third major fortnightly Wednesday store lamb sale of the season featured a prize show for pens of 25 or more Beltex-cross lambs, when the red rosette fell to a well-balanced pen from local breeder Andrew Haggas, of Grove Farm, Otterburn. (Wed, Aug 9) Exactly 25 in number, Mr Haggas had the assistance of his 13-year-old daughter, Sarah-Jane, a pupil at Skipton Girls High School, in choosing the first prize pen – she helped lamb them too.

Fortnightly Catalogue Sale of Store Lambs & Breeding Sheep Forward: 6213 Head, Overall av £63.07 A healthy trade for store lambs today with 5781 lambs through the ring. The pre-sale Show of Beltex store lambs was kindly judged by Peter Fox of Withgill, Clitheroe and chose a super pen of lambs presented by Andrew Haggas of Otterburn which despite being the last man in the ring went on to sell for £86.

Forward: 66 Prime cattle comprising 28 Clean Cattle (under 30 mos), 5 Clean Cattle (over 30 mos) & 33 Cast Cattle. 3,177 Prime Sheep comprising 2603 Prime Lambs & 574 Cast Ewes & Rams. 69 Rearing Calves. 23 Dairy Cattle.

Craven Dairy Auction (23 head) David Lawson of Arthington saw his two heifers win the newly calven heifer class this morning with his first prize heifer taking the championship in front of a handy Pedigree 2nd Calver from Wilson Stewart of Carlisle. Both Champion and Reserve found a new home with regular supporter Brian Blezard of Ribchester at £2000 and £1800 respectively. A healthy show of Incalf heifers were on show today with John Ireland, Thorpe Bassett taking first prize however it was the second prize heifer from Jeff and Judith Throup of Silsden Moor, Incalf to Aberdeen Angus bull duster and due September sold to Roger and Jack Naylor for £1380 with a section average of £1208.

White and red rose successes at Skipton prime cattle showcase Oakworth’s James Drake was crowned champion at Skipton Auction Mart’s August prime cattle show with his first prize 580kg British Blue-cross steer, an all-black snapped up for £1,476, or 254.5p/kg – both top price in class – by judge Simon Barker, of Skipton-based Stanforths Butchers, who took home three in total. (Monday, August 7)

Hall prime lamb champions head Skipton selling prices Yorkshire Dales sheep farmer Michael Hall, of Scosthrop Farm, Airton, secured championship honours at Skipton Auction Mart’s August prime lamb show with a five-strong 43kg Beltex-cross pen by home-bred tups that went on to sell to Countrystyle Meats Farm Shop in Lancaster for the day’s leading call of £138 per head, or 320.9p/kg. (Monday, August 7)

Lawsons return to land another Craven Dairy Auction title With more first calvers now coming through, the Lawson family, who run the Newbirks pedigree Holstein Friesian herd at Arthington in Wharfedale, made a welcome return to Skipton Auction Mart to win their first Craven Dairy Auction championship of the year with a heifer from their long-established and milk-rich Jazz family. (Monday, August 7)

Fortnightly Sale of Young Feeding Bulls, Store Bullocks & Heifers, Breeding Cattle Forward: 396 head of cattle Comprising: 77 Young Feeding Bulls, 15 Beef Feeding Cows, 273 Bullocks & Heifers, & 31 Breeding Cattle.

Rearing Calves to £515 (106) B&W av £61 Cont av £378.34 Native av £264.29 Summer show and sale of calves was a superb day for all attending with a cracking trade right throughout the day. Native calves were certainly good to sell today with a number of buyers forcing a strong trade for both bulls and heifers with bulls stopping at £380 and heifers to £330 both from the Griffiths family of Penistone.