Heavier pens fall as demand eases
Heavier cattle and fat cows suffer summer price corrections while vealers and milk calves hold up.
CATTLE prices have wound back as the onset of summer and drier conditions reduce demand pressure.
The market began softening a week ago, and extended into 10c/kg to 20c/kg price corrections over a lot of heavy slaughter cattle earlier this week.
National price indicators published by Meat and Livestock Australia showed all categories of cattle lost from 15-25c/kg liveweight in the past seven days.
After some strong results in the spring, the cow market stepped into summer at lower levels.
The big runs of heavy beef cows at Wagga Wagga in southern NSW were quoted at 270c/kg to 300c/kg liveweight to be about 18c cheaper than a week ago.
Some fat cows in fat score five condition escaping penalties in the past month dropped by up to 35c/kg, the National Livestock Reporting Service said.
Similar price corrections were also evident at southern markets for cows in early trading this year.
The report out of Mortlake in the Western District earlier this week was that good beef cows were about 24c/kg cheaper, easing back to between 285c/kg and 302c/kg.
A 25c correction on a 650kg cow equates to a drop of $160 out of a vendors pocket.
Some of the grown and manufacturing steers were also caught up in the easing trend.
At Pakenham, the best heavy steers held firm, but less export demand meant variances crept into the market and extra heavy, aged or plainer bullocks fell by up to 10c/kg.
Most bullocks sold from 346c/kg to 376c/kg.
Agents also reported softer and more selective buying trends over young cattle, although ongoing restocking and feedlot support is still keeping a reasonable base in the market.
The main run of heavy feeder steers at Wagga Wagga still averaged 418c/kg liveweight, although this was still 18c down on a week ago.
What was noticeable was a bigger price spread across these cattle, with the NLRS reporting a range of 364c/kg to 437c/kg. Bidding for feeder heifers broke up to make from 340c/kg to 446c/kg lwt.
For genuine vealers and high-yielding young trade cattle the market remained fairly solid at 400c/kg to a top of 465c/kg for a pick of the milk calves at Pakenham.
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