lots of cattle for sale

[Mark Bowles]

Hi all, i have just passed the 1000 mark for cattle ads since the sales site was revamped approx 14 months ago. Thank goodness its a little easier to do the software work otherwise i would be at it full time. Currently there seems to be loads of ads and not many sales although non-short bulls are selling well, are people selling without the board. I should think sales would be hit by the 2 big auction sales,last week and next weekend, i would think they would be taking vendors out of the market that we would normally have.
How is everybody getting on with sales in the current climate?

[Saffy]

Yes there are lots of dexters for sale but there are I think many reasons for this.

1. You very kindly make it easy and FREE for us all to put our animals up for sale here, which is wonderful - THANK YOU!

2. It is a very dry time and lots of us are short of grass.

3. Also I fear there are more softies in dexters than in mainstream farming and it isn't always good for a breed as it is tempting to keep all or at least too many of our heifers. This floods the market, brings down prices but more importantly brings down the overall standard of a breed. I feel that maybe if this year it is going to be harder to sell a cow, then this is the time to put any less than perfect heifers in the freezer or sell them for meat in some way, it is certainly what I am going to do wherever I can.

Stephanie

[Jac]

I am doing some research for the next DCS Bulletin and would be very interested to hear from breeders and others selling Dexters on how they determine the prices they charge for their stock. All replies will be treated in the strictest confidence. You can e-mail me at alvecoteherd@btinternet.com

Many thanks,
Jacqui Parkes

[Broomcroft]

* Yearlings etc, usually around £1.35 - 1.70 per kilo liveweight (i.e. £300'ish, or £400'ish for a cross)

* Non-Short bulling heifer £600

* Ordinary but good breeding cows 6-9 years old, around £450-550

* In-calf cow and with a grown calf at foot, £800-900.

That's what I do, haven't got a clue where that sits. Probably would charge a bit more now, as beef price is high.

[Jac]

Thanks for those prices Clive. What I was after was the rationale behind the price. The responses I have had so far are interesting.

[Nicrob]

Mark

I am glad you raised this.

I advertised Brambledel Prince of Thorns on this board in the autumn of 2010 and again just recently.

In the autumn I had a couple of tentative replies which came to nothing but I had no replies whatsoever to my recent ad. He was an 8 year old non short bull with plenty of progeny to be inspected and had a well known prefix. He certainly was still fertile and I have a number of new heifer calves this month from him. £600 didn't seem an unreasonable price.

Because I just simply didn't have the room I had to send him for slaughter. His deadweight was 350 kg and I received £1.95 per kg = a gross price of £682.30. Total abattoir costs for him and two barren cows were just £77.91. I had the cheque for £1372.87 within 48 hours.

I also had an 8 year old cow on the board with a new born heifer calf at foot for £250 but again no responses. Due to the cheque for the others I can keep her now but I might well have a further clear out to the abattoir later in the year.

I think Saffy is right - perhaps we are keeping too many heifers.

Nick Robinson
Monmouthshire

[Broomcroft]

Hi Jacqui,

My rationale is just the beef and cull prices really as an underlying value. As Nick just gave as an example, if I was selling a bull, the basic cull price (£550-700) is a back-stop, so with all the hassle of selling a bull I'd looking for at least another say £250 on top of that underlying value.

With older cows, the cull value (£300?) is the back-stop, so I'd be looking to better that by a long shot because there are no costs other than, for me, 10 minutes in a trailer to Shrewsbury.

A bulling heifer is worth £600 to the butcher, possibly more at the moment, so £600 (plus costs) is bottom line. I don't look for a large premium on those because they are usually easy to sell and they go in batches. And to be honest, I like to see them sold for breeding instead of being killed, apart from the odd sub-standard one which I will always kill regardless.

The youngsters are priced again based around saleable beef value, plus a bit because having calved them I've done all the work, all they have to do now is grow and get through probably one winter. If I were selling now, I'd be looking for quite a lot more than last year, not less as has been suggested.

My prices also follow the livestock markets.

Hope that makes sense!

[monica a waltho]

Someone has advertised for a herd of 90 cattle on the wanted list- I wonder if hes got fixed up?
Would have thought he could have got some good cattle off here even if it meant buying in 4/5s as quite alot of people seem to be selling several cattle at a time.Nice to see more pics even if some perhaps dont help show the cattle off.
Prices vary on how commercial people want to be and if they really NEED to sell as opposed to choosing to sell. If illness strikes,loss of grazing,closeness to abbatoir,general location etc are all deciding factors Im sure
Some are under priced some are over priced and some you'd be hard pressed to take home at a gift
but in general I think there are some good cattle at fair prices for anyone starting up.
Hope the Bancrofts have a good sale tomorrow