Thursday, March 28, 2024

Lamb numbers and prices are up

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The lamb market is almost getting sexy again, North Canterbury farmer Stu Thomson says. His Manahune farm had the biggest yarding in the annual late November Glenmark Drive on-farm sales and topped the market.
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A line of his 93 best prime lambs fetched $197 a head in the rain, compared to a top of $186 last year.

“It’s a real grass market with strong demand across all the weight ranges. 

“The works bought all the big boys and the bottom end of the store market was very good,” he said.

Confidence levels in the sheep industry are strong.

Manahune had 5500 lambs in the first of the sales last Tuesday.

An exceptional lambing in excellent conditions this season with high percentages, including a lot of triplets and very good survival rates means a lot  more lambs to sell this year.

But that meant Manahune’s average fell to $120 a head from $146 last year.

“We’re normally doing a lot more prime but with a lot more lambs we had a lot more stores this time,” he said.

As well as the $197 top price, Thomson and wife Sue sold another 526 prime lambs at $175.

Six farms were selling lambs on the day and all topped $170 for their top lines, a couple at better than $180 a head. That put the good prime lambs up round the high $7/kg to $8/kg, still very good money,  Hazlett Rural general manager and auctioneer Ed Marfell said.

Store lambs averaged $3.80/kg to $4/kg, a good gain on last year.

Ian and Jess Knowles at Glenmark Springs had a top prime price of $185 and Phil and Sally Thomson at Glenview got $183.

The six farms put 16,000 lambs up and all were sold in a very buoyant market, despite the rain that set in a couple of hours before the first of the auctions, Marfell said.

“We had a very good line-up of prime and store lambs and there’s good confidence about. Most people believe the lamb scene is very solid.”

The sales momentum continued on Wednesday at Hazlett Rural’s two on-farm sales at Banks Peninsula – Putiki Farm at Port Levy and Te Pohue Farm at Camp Bay – with stores averaging close to $4/kg with the sun shining again.

The big gallery of Glenmark Drive buyers had not been deterred by the rain.

“The lambs never look as good when their wool is wet but buyers see past that,” he said. 

“There were a lot of smiles, especially among the vendors, but this rain should set pasture up till Christmas at least and people are happy about that.”

A lot of prime lambs, at just killable weights, sold in the $120 to $140 range.

The best of the store lambs sold up to $120, with four to six weeks of finishing ahead of them.

Lighter lambs sold in the $90 to $100 range, with six weeks or so of finishing to come.

Buyers came from the wider central Canterbury area, Mid Canterbury, Southland and Otago.

With the good lambing figures the 16,000-lamb total was up about 2000 on last year and prices were well ahead with an average overall about $3.80/kg and lighter lambs about $4/kg.

Dovedale Farm had 2500 lambs to sell, Glenmark Springs 2000, Glenview 500, the Bethels at Shellrock 3000 including 800 blackface and J R Wigley at Dalrachrie Downs 2500 on offer. 

The Banks Peninsula sales were very strong with top prime lambs selling between $175 and $153 a head. Most store lambs were $110 to $130 a head for the close to $4/kg average.

Putiki had 3500 lambs for sale and Te Pohue kicked off the day with 900 lambs.

“With all these sales we get a lot of annual buyers coming back because they know the lambs, they know the vendors are putting the money in the genetics and they know the store lambs do well for them,” Marfell said.

With recent rain and plenty of grass around a couple of new buyers added some zing to the Putiki and Te Pohue sales. 

The programme started positively on Monday with prices mostly up on last year.

About 3100 mixed-sex lambs were put up at Highfield Farm at Waiau by the Northcote family partnership and the top 65 creme de la creme fetched $171 a head.

The other prime lambs were sold for $130 to $149. 

Stores went for $100 to $118 with a smaller cut of lambs at $93.

The average was about $3.70/kg, Marfell said.

That worked out at an average $120 a head, a $9 gain over last year.

It was on a lift of about 400 lambs over last year.

Most of the lambs were bought for North Canterbury and Darfield farms with just one load heading to south Otago. 

Following tradition, the Highfield lambs were sold straight off the mother, making paddocks available for irrigation for pasture growth in time for lambs to come down from the higher part of the partnership, Whaleback Station, for finishing in January.

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