Stortford Lodge: Winter's arrival seen in full pens

The pens were full at Stortford Lodge this June.

Winter arrived in Hawke's Bay in June. Along with a lot of rain, frosts cut grass growth, driving stock to Stortford Lodge in numbers.

Store lambs in particular came in big numbers. This resulted in an easing in prices as the quality also slipped although this was reversed at the end of the month when prices and quality headed up again.

Noticeable was the number of good station lambs from Wairoa. Other pens came from as far away as Taupo.

PGG Wrightson livestock manager Neil Common said it was a good opportunity for buyers to get quality forward store lambs.

Prime lambs also turned up in big numbers. Some of them were perhaps just short of being finished but the best of them continued to break the $200 mark. The lamb schedule is hovering around the $8/kg mark as processors fill orders from Europe and Asia.

One buyer said he saw India as being the next market breakthrough for New Zealand lamb.

Prime ewe numbers eased as pregnancy scanning came to an end. However, prices remained high for the best of them. Again, the quality varied during the month.
Demand from China underpins the ewe-meat market in New Zealand.

The in-lamb ewe offering increased during the month. Buyers favoured an early terminal ram date but all but the lightest ewes sold well.

In the cattle markets, the price of store cattle eased as farmers reached their winter stocking rates.

Good-quality traditional beef breeds continued to make money but lower-quality cattle were much harder to sell.

There were good numbers of two-year-old friesian bulls offered and demand for them was steady.

The numbers of prime cattle rose steadily in June, in sharp contrast to earlier in the year when there were several prime sales with none offered at all.

Prices lifted throughout the month and the best of the beef-breed steers broke the $3/kg mark. Cull cow prices rose above the $2/kg mark for all but the lightest animals.

Common said agents were expecting a quiet July as farmers and finishers were in winter mode, many busy with lambing and calving. Prime lamb numbers are expected to remain high as they could run the risk of cutting their adult teeth and losing value before spring.

Ewes with lambs at foot will arrive in late July and August and should make very good money.

Common said lamb schedules in particular were expected to continue upward.

He also predicted a steady lift in demand for beef cattle in late winter as farmers prepared for spring growth in August.

He said farmers were generally happy "apart from all the mud they have on their farms". ¦