An overall selling average of £123 for 4,898 head was recorded at the big opening North of England Mule gimmer lamb show and sale at Skipton Auction Mart, a fall of £7 on 2021.
However, the outcome was adjudged ‘decent’ in a year in which weather conditions and availability of grazing were forecast to have an effect on demand for lambs from returning customers across southern and eastern counties in particular.
In fact, the running lambs, which are generally sold into the south where drought conditions prevail, were, as anticipated, slightly harder to place.
CCM’s livestock sale manager Ted Ogden noted: “While the sale saw a sluggish early start as customers looked to gauge trade, the ringside quickly filled up.
"Many regular travelled buyers from across the English counties were present and lambs were in the main a decent trade, some vendors reporting sale averages up or similar, with some seeing sale averages down.”
Breed stalwarts from across the region were again out in force at what remains one of the earliest official ewe lamb fixtures to be staged on behalf of members of the North of England Mule Sheep Association (NEMSA).
As such, the event often represents a realistic barometer to potential future trading levels at seasonal sales across the north.
Consigning the flagship champion pen of ten for a fourth year were the Walker family - Geoff and Margaret and their two sons – from Brennand Farm, which runs to 6,000 acres of mainly fells high above Dunsop Bridge in Lancashire’s Forest of Bowland.
Their title winners were all by home-bred Bluefaced Leicester tups, mainly by Brennand N9, out of home-bred Swaledale ewes, going on to sell for a sale-topping £220 per head to Oxfordshire buyer William Allan, of Banbury.
The Walkers – NEMSA members for over four decades – also consigned the similarly bred sixth prize pen of tens, again from Brennand Farm, these earning a price tag of £170 each.
There was another repeat victory in the 20s show class for North Craven father and son, David and Robin Booth, from Old Hall Farm Feizor, north of Settle.
They retained their 2021 championship with a pen that contained 16 by home-bred tups, three by Harkerside, the other by a Midlock. The class victors sold at section top of £195 to Richard Hayes, of Winslow in Buckinghamshire.
Kevin Wilson, who farms with his wife Daphne and son, James, at Hewness House Farm, Blubberhouses, consigned three prize-winning pens and were also at the top end of the prices, their fourth placed tens making a solid £215, the runners-up and sixth in the 20s selling at £190 and £168 respectively.
Breeding throughout featured the family’s prolific F1 Bighead and his sons, plus a brace of Highberries tups.
Back with the tens, the reserve champion pen from the Kitching family, of Grisedale Farm, Threshfield, comprised seven by home-bred sons of their old Booth family H8 tup, another by a home-bred son of a Porter ram, the other two by Skipton-bought Otterburn Lodge and Oddacres tups.
They sold for £190, the fourth prize pen of 20s from the same home, most with similar breeding, though five by Hargreaves tups, away at £148.
The third prize tens from Chris and Christine Ryder, of Scaife Hall Farm, Blubberhouses – eight by the same home-bred M2 tup, another by a second home-bred, the other by a Highberries – made £165, with the fifth prize 20s from the same home going under the hammer at £150.
The fifth prize tens from John and Claire Mason and family at Oddacres Farm, Embsay, made £185, the third prize 20s from Wharfedale father and son, Francis and James Caton, of Weston Hall Farm, Weston, getting away at £155.
CCM Auctions again awarded prizes for the highest flock averages. Topping the trade with 100 or more lambs were the Dunsop Bridge Walkers with 131 to average £140, followed by the Wharfedale Catons with 194 at £135, then the Wilsons with 299 at £133.
The top average for under 100 lambs was claimed by Wiswell’s Ian Lancaster with 20 averaging £167, then the Booths with 85 at £148 and E&E Metcalfe, of Cowling, with 40 at £133.
