“It remains to be seen but it’s on the horizon,” Carrfields genetics sales specialist Neville Clark said.
PGG Wrightson national genetics manager Callum Stewart says people would be silly to think it will not happen.
“We say it every year and it hasn’t happened yet but there could be a bit of a correction in the two-year sales at some point.
“Farmers have a budget and some are deciding they can buy a yearling and then grow it out for a while and pay half the price of what a two-year-old would cost them.”
The issue is one of the short-term issues that could affect bull sales but the underlying strength of the sector is very good and so is the long-term outlook for both prime and manufactured beef, Stewart said.
There has been an amazing increase in the number of bulls sold as yearlings, Gisborne-based Clark said.
That coincided with a big increase in the number of heifers being mated and the focus on easy-calving, low birth weight calves.
“You’ve got more younger farmers now and they accept the benefits of breeding from heifers, they understand the EBVs and work out that they can get a live calf without too much stress.”
Some yearling bulls will be used early for mating while others will be put aside to develop into two-year-olds before going to stud. How many are put into the second group is the issue that could affect the two-year sales.
Clark and Stewart were talking after a successful 2018 spring yearling bull sale season in the North Island.
Clark was involved in the Turihaua Stud sale of Angus bulls in the Gisborne area where a 25 out of 25 clearance rate was achieved at an average price of $7584 with a top price of $14,000 to a stud buyer.
The average was up from $6614 a year earlier, a near 15% gain.
Confidence in the beef sector is high with prices well up on both the five-year and 10-year average beef prices, he said.
Sale clearance rates were in the 90% to 95% range overall, with good buying from stud and commercial clients and from beef and dairy farmers.
Mycoplasma bovis is part of farmer thinking, with growing interest in the closed-herd strategy.
That is especially so among dairy buyers, New Zealand Farmers Livestock agent Brent Bougen said.
Beef farmers tend to have closed herds anyway though traders always have to be in the wider market. Good confidence levels with the schedule still at good levels and reasonable pasture conditions in most areas are encouraging farmers to push up average prices, he said.
Stewart said the Wanganui-based Riverton Ezicalve Hereford Stud had a very good sale, selling all 127 bulls on offer with an average $3900 price and a top price of $5500.
Herefords typically sell well at this time of year because of dairy market demand.
The Ezicalve Morrison family business at Marton also had a strong Hereford sale with a 100% clearance of 105 bulls at an average $3700, boosted by a top price of $13,000 for an animal heading to a new home in Gore.
Mt Mable Angus Stud at Kumeroa in Manawatu had its inaugural yearling sale, selling 26 out of 26 at an average $3746 with two sales at $6000 to commercial buyers.
Another good inaugural yearling sale result came with from the Canadian Speckle Park breed at Premier Cattle Co at Cambridge. With appeal to beef and dairy buyers all 13 yearling bulls sold at an average of $9300 and top prices of $14,750 and $11,000 to stud buyers.
