Weekly Sales News – 14th March 2017

Top price per kg – 208p – P Ashlee; Top price per head – £101 – A C Hulme & Sons

Report on trade: A smaller entry in the pens this week and a much improved trade  throughout with numbers nationally slightly down on last week helping to sharpen demand. All grades of sheep were wanted with the overall average distinctly improved on last week and a premium on offer for the farm assured sheep who were overnight lairaged and presented clean and empty.

Heavy hoggets were trading at a similar level, if not slightly improved on last week to a top price of £88.50 from Swanley Farm and closely followed by S B & A E Martin at £86 (twice). Best continental export grade hoggets sold to 208p per kg from P Ashlee for some Beltex hoggets closely followed by D C Foy at 206p.

 Producers please note – For top results please present well fleshed lambs which are preferably dry and clean. Lairage facilities are available every Monday evening.

Sheep sales here in Ashford are supported by buyers representing a large cross section of abattoirs throughout the country. Please ensure your FABBL status is up to date and if you are not FABBL assured seriously consider becoming so – certain buyers are restricted to the purchase of only farm assured stock.

Report on trade: A smaller entry this week met a similar trade, if not a little improved, on last week with the best ewes all making in excess of £80. Many “also ran” types were in the pens, presumably lambing shed cast offs, which do impact on the overall averages. Leaner sorts on offer traded between £30 and £60 with a few more familiar grazing men starting to show some interest with the warmer weather starting to get the grass growing again.

Top prices were included Texels to £81 from P H & P E Skinner, Suffolk crosses to £80 form P & C Burden and Westerlands Stud, Mules to £67.50 from I T Henshaw & Sons and Romneys to £71 from J Vine.

Report on trade: An exceptional trade for store hoggets saw the best selling readily around £65 and up to £68.50 for a pen of Charollais crosses consigned by Pynn Contractors with only small long term sorts below £50. We strongly recommend If you have store hoggets, sell now while buyers are still keen and food availability is good.

Other top prices include Charollais crosses £66.80 from H & S Nesfield, Texel crosses £65 from L Anderson with Suffolk crosses £67.20 from R & S L M Smith, £65.50 from P R & H R Vellacott,  £65 from Godden & Readman and £63.80 from M & R Morton. Averages: Top £68.50 and aver £58.15.

A few couples were penned this week mostly selling in the region of £50 per life.

Report on trade: A nice quality entry of young lambs sold well to average £12.17 and a top price of £20.36

Report on trade: A strong trade for a disappointingly small entry of cattle with several individual buyers and many more could have been sold at favourable prices. A smart Limousin cross heifer topped the market at £1329 (224p) from Westlands School YFC with other butcher type continental cross heifers at £1170 (204p) from W Alexander (Shoreham) and £1145 (205p) from D W Page & Son.

Over 30 mths cattle made up to £1120 (155p) for Shorthorn cross steer from J Berryman.

This was a good trade – please compare your price and support this livestock auction system while you still have an opportunity.

Report on trade: Another truly outstanding trade for all grades of cows and whilst we are holding our numbers up well there is no doubt that more would sell to great advantage – keep looking for candidates! Cows for slaughter or feeding finding intense competition whether assured, non assured, lean, or exempt.

We were short of the very best and had only a few real fed cows. Some best shaped types made 140 to 175p per kg and plenty of fair meat beef cows 130-145p. Best feeders were an  outstanding trade, young cows very dear and only the very oldest less than 100p.

Limousin 175p I D Machin (Non FA), 169p and £927 Little Exceat Farm; Blondes 149p £979 I D Machin (Non FA); British Blue 143p £990 Little Exceat Farm ; South Devons 143p £949 P N & C Burden; Aberdeen Angus 139p, 131p S C Gammon (Non FA), 130p, 127p, 125p £1139 Barfrestone Court Farms (Non FA) and 129p,127p £991 J Batchelor & Ptnrs with Sussex 128p, 126p £1058 D Welsh (Non FA).

The dairy lines saw only a few best meat cows and were mostly lean steakers and boners from the parlour today. All looked very well sold indeed. Producers need to be highlighting their spring culls before turnout approaches and yard weight is lost when the gate gets opened!!

Holstein maiden heifers 135p, 130p M A & F W Owen; Holstein cows 128p £1011 Little Exceat Farm , 127p (2), 126p, 124p, 122p £1044, £1042, £1023 Goddard & Son; British Friesian 123p, 122p B J Goodsell & Son; Ayrshire 112p S H Gribble and Jerseys 98p, 96p, 89p £522 Hickson Bros.

Stock bull trade is outstanding but flesh is important.  A superb fleshed British Blue 145p £1764; Limousin 117p £1116; Sussex 117p £1118 and Simmental 103p £1065.

Report on trade: A large entry with a large percentage of native and dairy bred cattle were well received with a good attendance of buyers ensuring competitive returns throughout. The best of the yearling continental cross cattle made £800 to £1000 while Simmental x Friesian steers at 19-20 mths made up to £1040 from R P Kent & Son.

The native bred cattle attracted lots of interest with the pick of the trade seeing Sussex steers make up to £875 from Priors Byne Farm and a run of 10mths Aberdeen Angus cross steers from £742 up to £788 from R Brown & Daughter while yearlings made to £850 from N J & A M Howlett.

Good premiums are available for hard, out wintered cattle and several customers were in attendance purchasing strong crossbred heifers suitable for breeding.

Principal prices not already mentioned included:

Auctioneer: Peter Kingwill 07795 200357

Report on trade: Plenty of interest in this section and more were wanted by a strong crowd of potential customers. Spring looks as though it is coming early at the moment !!

A 4yr old crossbred Blonde bull sold to work at £1100.There was good interest in the first draft of Belted Galloway stock from the Allanbay Park Estate with cows and calves making to £800, in calf cows to £720 and heifers £580.

Beef cross cows and calves were also in strong positive demand. A Simmental heifer and calf made £1145 from D W Page & Son; Aberdeen Angus and continental cows with young stabiliser heifer calves from Lord Rayleigh Farms £1110, £1080, £1070, £1060, £1020, etc; In calf Aberdeen Angus cross cows £865 to £770 A C Hulme & Sons and older Charolais cows £950 from Mrs L M Howard.

Report on trade: Every sale is different and this week dairy bulls and 4 to 7 mths old well reared stirkes made the headlines while there looked to be value for the buyers in the mixed selection of beef cross calves offered.

Highlights this week included:

British Blue Bulls to £315 at 9 weeks from Ledger Farms and £225 at 7 weeks from R Torrance & Son.

British Blue Heifers to £230 at 8 weeks from Ledger Farms and £260 at 8 weeks from R Torrance & Son

Limousin bulls to £252 at 7 weeks from Squerryes Estate Daiy Ptnrs

Holstein bulls to £98 at 11 weeks from M W Goddard

Aberdeen Angus Bulls to £250 and £230 at 2 weeks from P J Forknall and heifers to £170 at at 7 weeks from W S Furnival Ltd.

Hereford cross bulls to £420 4 to 6 mths with heifers to £425 from M Gammons

British Blue bulls £430 at 5 mths and heifers £400, Aberdeen Angus bulls £405 and heifers, 365, Limousin bull at 7 mths £480 all from M Gammons

Holstien bulls to £260 at 4 and 5 mths from M Gammons, young Holstein bulls to £98 at 11 weeks from M W Goddard. 17 Dairy bulls averaged £98.14

Please keep your entries of calves coming. At our fortnightly sales we expect to have plenty of enquiries for all shapes, sizes and ages of stock. Thank you all for texts and messages with early notice of your entries for forthcoming sales – it does help.

Report on trade: The pig trade was not quite as fierce as we have seen in recent sales with the best finished 100 to 105p per kg and a few over this and second grade sorts generally 75 to 95p. Culls traded at similar levels to recent sales and stores offered found plenty of bidders.

Best finished pigs made this week came from S Scott & Son (112p), P W & P Sim (108), S J M Evans (110p) and C B Hope (108p).

In the cull pens a 330kg sow came to £148.50

Medium sized Berkshire growers made £50 and £52 from the Canterbury Oast Trust.

Our pig sales are held once a fortnight and with the summer now we are seeing plenty of competition and more confidence in the pig sector after very low levels which prevailed for about 3 months in the spring. Please keep in touch with us here in Ashford if you have pigs to sell.

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Lairage bookings for Monday and Thursday evenings

Please ring David Martin on 07860 114650 to confirm when you are delivering stock to the market for overnight lairage.

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DEFRA and our Local Authority trading standards officers regularly remind us of our responsibilities regarding unfit animals. No unfit animal should be exposed for sale in a market.

We have been reminded by the Local Authority that it is against current Welfare and Market Regulations to move stock to market, or any other holding, in the final stages of pregnancy (final 4 weeks). Please be careful with dates on breeding stock and cull stock that might turn out to be in lamb or in calf.

All animals should be fit to travel. All in milk cows should to be milked out prior to movement to market. Do not present lame sheep or those, for any reason, which are not fit to be transported.

Thanks for your attention to these matters.

Livestock entry forms, FCI declarations and movement licences

It is essential that these forms are fully completed for every consignment of stock brought to the market. Please help us to provide you with the high level of service you expect from us by getting this right.

It is a legal requirement that entry form and food chain declarations are competed correctly.

We regularly notice that the information is missing from forms. Please can you ensure that all information is completed in future.

It would be very useful to market staff and thereby help with the speed of processing your stock, if a few further simple rules were followed on entry forms particularly for larger entries.

1. Steers and heifers are listed separately. 2. Passports are presented in numerical order. 3.Breeds are listed separately – for example Aberdeen Angus away from Limousin

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South East Point to Point Meetings (www.pointingse.com)

Updated 14^th March 2017 

The fixture list for the season has been circulated with this report recently. Further copies are available here in the market

Sunday 26^th March – Old Surrey, Burstow and West Kent; Penshurst, Kent – 1.30pm

Sunday 9^th April – Southdown & Eridge; Godstone, Surrey. RH9 8DB at 2.15pm

Saturday 15^th April – Ashford Valley; Charing, Kent. TN27 0JS – 2pm

Monday 17^th April – East Kent: Aldington, Kent. TN25 7EJ – 2pm.

Saturday 22^nd April – Old Surrey, Burstow and West Kent; Penshurst, Kent. TN8 7DD – 2pm

Saturday 29^th April – Chiddingfold, Leconfield and Cowdray; Parham, West Sussex. RH20 2ER – 2pm

Hay, Straw and fodder

Updated 14^th March 2017

For Sale – Large quantities of hay. Ring 07860 623196.

For Sale – Large quantity Quadrant rectangular bales of 2016 season made threshed ryegrass hay. Good quality. Romney Marsh. Ring 07885703458

For Sale – Large quantities of 2016 made and gathered organic hay, haylage and silage. Buckhurst Park, East Sussex. Ring 01892 770220 or email: office@buckhurstpark.co.uk

For Sale – 100 Mini Hesston 4 string bales of oat straw, 60 Mini Hesston 4 string and 200 4’ round bales of exceptional hay. Transport can be arranged get at cost. East Sussex. Ring 01580 819000 or 07768 771933

For Sale – 157 Massey Ferguson 8’ x 4’ 6 string bales of 2016 season gathered winter barley straw, stored dry. East Kent. Ring 07703 130575

For Sale – 2000 Conventional bales of 2016 season made meadow hay. East Kent. Ring 07885 305520.

For Sale – 150 Claas Quadrant 2016 season gathered winter barley straw, stored dry. Ashford area. Ring 07850 789113.

For Sale – upto 500 Conventional bales of 2016 season made hay. West Kent. Ring 07905 269113.

For Sale – 200 Round bales of 2016 season made meadow hay. Maidstone area. Ring 07813 741636

For Sale – 50 Round wrapped bales of 2016 season made haylage from organically farmed grassland. Mid Kent. Ring 01233 756468.

For Sale – 500 bales of 5` long mini Hesston bales of July 2016 meadow grass haylage with delivery available at cost. Chiddingfold, Surrey. Ring 01428 654695 or 07966 452256.

For Sale – 300 to 400 wrapped 4 string bales of 2016 season haylage and 50 7’ long 6 string bales of meadow hay. Kent / Sussex borders. Ring 07773 384271 or 07973 634519.

To advertise your stocks in this section please speak to Mark Cleverdon or Adam Leonard for details of our very reasonable charges

RABI, FCN, Kent Herdsmans, Ashford Cattle Show and YFC Club news

Updated 7^th March 2017

Fund raising events over the next few months include:

Clay Pigeon Shoot – Friday 31^st March. West Kent Shooting School, Brenchley. TN12 7DG. 70 bird R.A.B.I Charity shoot. Ring Sally Field 01903 882741 or Charles Tassell 01622 858733. £75

Beef Dinner, British Beef Week – Saturday 22^nd April. London Beach Hotel, Tenterden. TN30 6HX. Limited to 100 tickets. Ring David Chantler 01622 850207

Kart Racing – April or May, date TBC. Buckmore Park. Ring Charles Tassell 01622 858733

Elmley Bird Sanctuary private tour and barbeque  – Sunday 14^th May. Emley, Isle of Sheppey. ME12 3RW. Ring Roger Pickard 01227 832045 for full details

Watch this space for details of more events next week and ongoing

Kent Herdsmans Club

Monday 10th April at 7.30pm – visit to Ovenden Tipper Services, Eythorne, Dover. CT15 4ND

For all details on Herdsman’s Club events contact Chairman Alan Jull 01304 852991 or Jo Masters 01580 240568

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A huge “Thank you” from Sarah Burden

Updated 7^th March 2017

Sarah Burden (Dale’s wife) set up a charity stall in the foyer on Tuesday and raised £863 for Prostate Cancer Awareness. We all wish her well in the London Marathon – search Sarah Burden on Just Giving website to sponsor her efforts.

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Kent Wool Growers wool sheet distribution

Wool sheets will be available between 10am and 3 pm on Tuesdays 4^th and 11^th April. Further information is available from the Wool desk on 01233 648052

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Kent County Ploughing Match

Saturday 18^th March at Malmaynes Hall Farm, Stoke, Rochester. ME3 9SG.

Sponsored by the Kent County Agricultural Society. For all information ring Ron on 07929 374244

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South East Farmer and Farm Machinery magazines

The March edition of this popular regional farming magazine is now available here in the market. Hobbs Parker are regular contributors to the editorial content.

In addition our Property Consultants Outlook for Spring 2017, is included with this months publication and available hare in the . Articles looking at current issues affecting many aspects of land ownership make interesting reading for all landowners and occupiers.

Hobbs Parker Auctioneers and Car Auctions

run over 200 auction sales every year

Our next Auction Sales are ……

Commercial Vehicles

Thursday 23^rd March at 3.00pm

Commercial vehicle sale to include special sale of leisure vehicles

Land & Property

Wednesday 29^th March

Please contact James Hickman for more details

Pedigree Sussex Spring Show & Sale

Friday 7^th April

This is the Sussex Cattle Societies sale of breeding bulls and females

Horse & Saddlery Sale

Thursday 13^th April at 10am

Catalogues will be available about a week before the sale.

Entries expected of riding ponies, event horses and youngstock

New & nearly new saddlery & tack, grooming kit, yard equipment, rugs, harness Riding boots, show jackets, jodhpurs, body protectors, yard clothing & boots

Collective Machinery & Equipment sale

Friday 21^st April at 9.30am.

Catalogues will be available about a week before the sale.

Lots will include new & newly near mowers & garden machinery. New tools, farm & agricultural equipment, timber plus large selection of miscellaneous items.

Shenley Farm Machinery sale

Saturday 13^th May at 9.30am

Large entries of tractors, trailers, vehicles, arable equipment, haymaking equipment, tractor attachments & spares, livestock kit, garden machinery, workshop tools and a large and