New centre record realised for dairy heifer at Skipton
A new mart record price of £3,950 for a dairy animal was set at the Christmas Craven dairy auction at Skipton.
The record setter came from the Newbirks pedigree Holstein herd of David and Claire Lawson, of Mill Farm, Arthington – the most prolific dairy champions at Skipton this year. It was also a personal best for the Lawson family.
Sale leader was their first-prize, freshly calved heifer is from the Newbirks Jazz family, with five generations of VG or EX behind it. This daughter of Picston Shottle was shown by the couple’s daughter, 19-year-old Suzy Lawson.
Three weeks-calved and giving 34 litres, the victor was the subject of lively bidding, before being knocked down to Stephen Jeanes, of the Birks Farm pedigree dairy herd on Glusburn Moor.
Winning the reserve ticket was the freshly calved heifer and second prize winner from Brian Moorhouse, of Hesper Farm, Bell Busk. His homebred Holstein Friesian, a month calved and giving 33kg, is by the Semex sire Rietben Tee Off, out of a strong cow family. She sold for £2,400.
The Stainbank pedigree herd of Robin Jennings in South Stainley presented the third prize freshly calved heifer, which sold for £1,850 to WP Grattan, of Brimham Rocks.
Meanwhile Andrew Jennings, who runs the Abbeyhouse pedigree herd at Fountains presented the second prize freshly calved cow, which headed the pedigree prices at £2,020 on joining Wick Williams, of Nantwich.
The first and third prize newly calven cows both came from South Yorkshire vendor Philip Penrose, of Silkstone, Barnsley. The victor topped the commercial cow prices at £2,150 on joining Mark Goodall in Tong, while the third in class sold for £2,100 to the Wilson farming family from Penrith.
There was clean sweep of the prizes in a standalone show class for newly calven Brown Swiss heifers for mart regulars David and Pauline Brown, of Ramsgill, which sold to a high of £1,720 to Wick Williams, at an average of £1,640.
The Browns also presented the first prize in-calf heifer, a pedigree Brown Swiss sold for £1,480 to B Haigh, of Oxenhope, with the second and third prizes falling to black and whites from Kelbrook’s Henry Wilson. The runner-up sold for £1,350 to MR and GP Beresford, of Halton West.
RE Ayrton & Son, of Eastby, stepped forward with the first prize maiden heifer, sold for £980 to Laycock’s Samatha Sugden.
Alan Throup, of Silsden Moor, had the pick of the young stock trade when selling a brace of ten-week-old heifer calves, one of them the third prize winner in the maiden heifer show class, for £500 each to TH Gibson, of Kendal.
Also notable at £2,180 was the top price newly calven commercial heifer from Calton’s Robert Crisp, which joined John Howard in Carleton.
Pedigree newly calven heifers averaged £2,134 and pedigree newly calven cows £1,960, with the selling average for commercial counterparts £1,845 for heifers and £2,123 for cows. In-calf heifers averaged £1,005.
The fixture also featured a dispersal sale of 30 in-milk dairy heifers and cows – predominantly Holstein Friesian with a number of Swedish Red-cross – on behalf of Peter North, of EH North and Son, based at Calverley House Farm, Calverley, who is going out of milking. They sold to a high of £1,900 twice at an overall average of £1,522 per head.
Skipton Auction Mart’s dairy auctioneer Sam Bradley noted: “Trade, although a little tentative at the start, soon warmed up, with the majority of vendors receiving a strong trade. All in all, a great day and further proof that we can sell big numbers – and sell them well.”