[bloomer]

i did post somewhere i got called away to support a good friend at a funeral today :-( needed doing but meant i missed the sale...

[SallyintNorth]

We bought 3 BFL x Shetland ewe lambs at the sale, and as fleecewife says then went on to buy 5 X gimmers on farm.  (Thanks for the marriage bureau on this one, fw!  )

One of the 5 is a 3/4 Shetland 1/4 Southdown, she's for my fleece flock.     The other 4 are more commercial types; all bar one have some Shetland in them.  Nice strong gimmers, should do well and hopefully will have lambs with nice fleeces as a bonus 

The other little family you know about fw - she's still pondering whether to sell the complete outfit or just the ewe lambs.  She has to decide before our next trip up, I've told her! 

[oldwolf]

Didn't stay for long but was shocked at how cheap some of the ewe lambs went for!
 

[SallyintNorth]

Good types were £75+, but even some of these were passed out unsold at £60 and below.  Nice little ewes, nothing special but not star quality, could readily be picked up for £45.

Cracking young tups could be had for £100 or even less.

Prices were well down on last year.

I suspect it's a recession thing.  A lot of rare and primitive breed keepers will have a flock as an interest, not so much a commercial operation. Everyone's having to tighten their belts, so having to reduce numbers.  Hence more to sell, needing to accept what the market will pay, coupled with less folk buying as they too are needing to reduce numbers.

If you wanted to start a flock, you could've bought strapping healthy Soay ewes for £16, a good Shetland tup lamb for less than £50...

[Fleecewife]

I think the rubbish catalogue has a lot to answer for.   The Shetland Sheep Society will be producing their own for next year with full details of each animal - maybe if there had been fewer internal punch-ups going on in the Society they might have got round to it for this year  .  For the rare breeds, there needs to be more info given in the catalogue to attract buyers, and encourage breeders to bring their better stock.  There were no good Hebrideans, for example, as breeders know the prices will be low, and they can sell for far more at the coming HSS sale in Stirling, so no need to bother with Lanark.
 
If the RBST would approve the sale and conduct it according to their regs, then both buyers and sellers would increase.  The same holds for the rare breeds sale which accompanies the Heb sale at Stirling.
Lanark is a superb mart since it was rebuilt, so the sale should and could have been so much better.
 
Those Soay were so beautiful - do you know who bought them Sally?
 
 
Sorry you couldn't come Bloomer but what you did was more important.

[bigchicken]

I think there was an exceptionally large number of Shetlands for sale with numbers being swelled by English breeders who were up for the Shetland Sheep Society A G M , I sold all my Shetlands who mostly went to commercial buyers and bought a nice black ram lamb and a couple of black ewe lambs of good quality from well known breeders. I also bought a top quality fawn katmogget ram lamb privately a few days before the sale I'm hoping they improve the quality of my flock. Sorry I didn't get to meet any of you folks but there will be a next time, cheers all.

[Rosemary]

Well, we're disapointed the Dexter Cattle Society couldn't get cattle together to link a sale with the Festival but we would like to link the Festival with a sale of rare breeds, in association with RBST.

Happy to discuss with interested breed societies after this year's Festival.

[Victorian Farmer]

This is the first full season with no money the next 2 rare breed sales thainstone and Carlile the big ones. So far only one was good DIngwall i do see things getting bad Flore £22 and spuds iv seen £16 pound. So do i take a knock and sell cheap at the farm or sell at the sales. It do sent matter there is no way i can break even. i never get dawn if the stock make low price its the sellers day that's haw i get round it. Things looked good for the first sale at dingwall i new i had better stock the folowing week thainstone the good stock was low only my stuff made money. SO thats haw 2013 has gone a big ask next week thainstone and then Carlile keep posting prices this will give us an idea haw things are.

[Victorian Farmer]

You could do a show and sale this do sent work at carlile because the folk who judge keep the local breeders Happy but if you had a person who new is stock it would work. The next thing price per cage £2 or 3 would be good. So Rosemary i think it would work. You need a person to look and say no the stock is bad that way only good stock is sold. cock birds a section for this if the cock makes no money there should be no charge for the cage then no bode makes ENE think. I would sell at the growers and leave carlile out. £5 plus vat and 200 miles per cage. It would help in prove stock in the long run. So you could do sheep hens goats. The going rate for sheep is £12 at these sales.

[langfauld easycare]

my belties just made there reserve . my soays and soay x made hardly anything but they were there for sale . with hindsight i should have took the heaviest of them to dunblane but freezers are quite full the now .the only thing i brought home was a easycare tup . wasnt giving him away the one i sold was worth more but it was more than killing money so let him go .
a couple of my mates payed mental money for goats [size=78%] [/size] [/size][size=78%]  [/size]
[/size]

i think they should have either had 2 rings going or split the shetland sale in half with the other stuff in the middle . i heard a few folk say they were going as they couldnt be bothered to wait any more. it was a long pull if you werent interested in the shetlands
 

[SallyintNorth]

Those Soay were so beautiful - do you know who bought them Sally?

I don't know, no - I was having to look at the floor and hold my hands very firmly clenched by my sides...

[Fleecewife]

As well I'd gone by then.
 
 
Someone who lives near us had sheep for sale there and clearly brought several home - they are in his fields with the yellow mart tags still around their necks, held on by elastic.  Someone just up the road must have bought some of the Zwartbles, as there is a group of them still with their yellow tags in his fields.   Why would they leave them on?  Laziness or could there be a purpose?

[SallyintNorth]

I'm ashamed to say that my 3 had their yellow lot number tags on until Sunday morning too.    My excuse is it was dark when we got home and unloaded them and I completely forgot they'd still have them on!     We didn't have a chance on Saturday but we got them in Sunday morning, dosed them and removed their lot numbers.