“It was a battle to get the prices but we were prepared for it,” PGG Wrightson South Canterbury livestock manager Joe Higgins said.
“We saw the signs in what has happened round the country.”
There was resistance to paying the prices fetched in the opening rounds of autumn calf sales.
Some buyers of calves at higher prices last year didn’t make as much money as they expected and some still had stock to sell so some buyers from last year did not come back this year.
The Fairlie Basin sale was the fourth of five sales in the South Canterbury programme and with 2240 calves yarded, is the second biggest after the Mackenzie Basin sale, but only just smaller.
Steers held their value better than heifer calves, Higgins said.
The heifers generally struggled to make good margins over the last year because of lower weight gains.
Fairlie Basin also had a lower number of heavy calves presented.
Heavier steers generally made $3.90/kg to $4/kg, medium animals $4/kg to $4.20 and lighter calves $4.20/kg to $4.60/kg.
Some bigger lines with lighter to medium steers climbed just above $5/kg because of the numbers presented, the convenience of dealing with one vendor and a track record from vendors of calves that shifted well to other farms.
Notable in that group was Fox Peak Station, which had about 500 steers and 400 heifers, mainly Angus and Angus-Hereford, entered. The steers especially averaged a 10c/kg premium over the general market.
There were very few heavier heifer calves entered across the sale because most of that type were kept back for breeding.
Medium heifers fetched $3.20/kg to $3.50/kg and lighter calves $3.40/kg to $3.70/kg.
Only two heifer lines went above $4/kg, whereas at earlier sales most reached that mark.
The final South Canterbury calf sale, with stock from Geraldine area, was to be held at Temuka on Friday with a yarding of 1500 expected.
Meanwhile, farmers are being paid record prices for lambs for this time of year as supplies tighten, AgriHQ says.
North Island, processors are offering $7.20/kg for lamb, up from $5.75/kg this time last year and the five-year average of $5.16/kg. In the South Island, the price last week was $7.05/kg, up from $5.50/kg last year and the five-year average of $5.02/kg.
Lamb production was very low in February and March, with 1.89 million lambs killed in the four weeks to March 17, 20% below the same period last year, 31% behind the five-year average and lower than any previous year as far back to 1990.
March lamb exports were just 31,500 tonnes, the lowest for March since at least 2007 and 22% behind the five-year average.
Farmers sent higher volumes to slaughter earlier in the season and are now holding stock as onfarm conditions improve.
“Lamb and ewes remained high-value commodities both at the farmgate level and on the export market,” analyst Reece Brick said.
“Throughput did climb from the lows of February as more lambs began reaching target weights, however, this was not enough to have a detrimental impact on prices. On-farm conditions have largely stayed in farmers favour.”
