Dry conditions lead to record-breaking yardings at Wagga

Wagga Selling Agents Association has broken two records within one week for yarding size as Victorian saleyards host “unprecedented” numbers before Easter.

Several saleyards in Victoria and the NSW Riverina have reached “unprecedented” yarding numbers in the past week.

And Wagga Wagga Saleyards has broken two records within one week.

Livestock agents at Wagga Wagga yarded 7813 cattle on Monday – the highest number recorded for a prime sale – up from 7338 in February last year.

The record came just five days after the saleyards broke its lamb and sheep yarding record, with 77,523 stock sold last Thursday, 1630 more than the previous record set in December 2023.

Wagga Wagga Selling Agents Association president Isaac Hill believed the prolonged dry, public holidays and interrupted sale weeks were the leading reasons for the yarding influx.

“They are unprecedented, that’s evident in the records on both days,” Mr Hill said.

“It’s getting harder to source supplementary feed in, and the prices to this point have remained high so there are conversations being had.

“Rather than spend money on them and hold them for an indefinite period, here locally they are selling them so that they can hold back onto core livestock, priorities are being made.”

Mr Hill said despite the cattle yarding increase, the market remained within 5 per cent of its margin over the past fortnight. But mutton returned to 400-450c/kg on Thursday after it reached 650-700c/kg the previous week.

He said good, killable lambs continued to fetch strong prices and sold to about 800c/kg, with grain-fed lambs achieving a higher price.

“Yarding size will remain high while it’s dry. It won’t be excessively high when we get clear of the public holidays, but once we see rain we’ll see a significant drop in the numbers because there is an element of unfinished lambs and weaner cattle people would prefer to add weight on,” Mr Hill said.

“In the Wagga region, we can capitalise on a break of weather whenever it comes, but it is getting a bit concerningly late for any country with any elevation, like the Upper Murray and Snowy Mountains region.”

Elders Wagga Wagga livestock agent Henry Booth said he believed the numbers would return to normal after Easter. He said there was still plenty of stock to move.

“Although we do have a break from the saleyards there’s a lot of stock moving behind the scenes as well,” he said.

“Personally, in my business there has been a healthy movement of livestock to direct streams.”

Victorian producers were also waiting for an autumn break, as Yea Saleyards’ April store sale had 3227 cattle. Livestock agents labelled the numbers “unprecedented” ahead of Easter.

Corcoran Parker livestock agent Justin Keane from Wangaratta said they were expecting 500 cattle at their store sale on Thursday this week, but that number would more likely be closer to 1000 now.

“They just keep finding more,” Mr Keane said.

Elders Delaney Livestock and Property director Anthony Delaney said vendors were selling calves six weeks earlier than usual due to seasonal conditions and the encouragement of cattle prices.

At Ballarat, Nutrien Ballarat livestock agent John McKinnon said agents expected about 2200-2250 cattle at the April sale last Friday, but had 1000 more at 3512.

“The sale was a week early because of Easter … We ended up with an extra 1000 cattle we hadn’t counted on when we set the sale,” he said.