Two records broken at Forbes with new national lamb price
A Eugowra farmer who “took a punt” on lambs in March has set a new national record. Meanwhile, southern dominance underpins the Forbes lamb market.
Another national lamb record has been set at Forbes in Central West NSW within one week, with a pen of lambs selling for $460 a head.
It was also the largest sale on record for the Forbes saleyard facility as it offered 59,000 sheep, including 43,250 lambs and hoggets and 16,800 mutton.
MCC Chudleigh Dobell director Adam Chudleigh said prices had cheapened but the lamb market remained solid.
“Overall in a nutshell it would’ve been up to $20 a head cheaper as a general rule, but still very strong,” he said.
“We’ve been going really, really well with our quality yardings and that’s how we’ve been drawing the numbers, we’ve been yarding such good quality lambs. That’s dipping away now.”
The top-priced pen of 33 second-cross lambs weighed between 90-112kg, and had been fed on lucerne hay, barley and lupins in a total mixed ration. Mr Chudleigh estimated the carcass weight would be about 45kg.
The Eugowra vendors Matt and Kylie Parker manage about 2000 first-cross ewes, and Mr Parker said he decided to “take a punt” on trade lambs in March. He purchased them for $138 a head, and he believed they had eaten about $90 of feed.
“We thought they’d be close, I didn’t actually think they would (break the record),” Mr Parker said.
“We were over the moon, really. We bought them off AuctionsPlus in March as store lambs, we ran them a bit hard on stubble paddocks for the first few weeks. Since then we put them in our feedlot on grain for the last 90 days.”
Meanwhile, a new state record was set at the Central Victorian Livestock Exchange at Ballarat on Tuesday.
TB White and Sons agents sold the top pen of 45 lambs for $450 to Thomas Foods International.
There were 18,450 sheep and lambs on offer at Ballarat on Tuesday, including 14,000 lambs.
The national trade lamb indicator currently sits at 1179c/kg carcass weight.
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