There is a cautious optimism for Victorian sheep studs’ on-property ram sales that ramp up this week.
Landmark’s stud stock manager south east region Ray Attwell said the Merino multi-vendor sales and the on-property sales in South Australia in the past few weeks boded well for Victoria’s upcoming sales.
He said they had been equal or on the positive side of last year’s strong results.
For example Sheepvention’s pen of five rams, multi-vendor sale on Monday at Hamilton, reached a record average price of $2785 record average.
Its also recorded a strong clearance of 308 out of 340 rams and topped at $30,000, just shy of the 2001 record of $31,000.
Sheepvention president Gordon Last said the sale’s success demonstrated confidence in the industry.
Mr Attwell said he was predicting this solid support to continue, thanks to people trying to rebuild flocks after drought in the past year; sustained strong wool prices; and people’s desire to improve the quality of their sheep, particularly their wool.
Elders southern zone stud stock manager Ross Milne agreed that indicators were towards a “pretty good year”.
He said stable rural commodity prices, including for wool, sheepmeat and beef, made him and his team “fairly optimistic” that most Victorian studs could match the strong clearance and averages of last year.
He said while the handful of sheep that sold for more than $10,000 at Sheepvention’s multi-vendor sale went to studs, commercial woolgrowers remained the backbone of the sale and they were “prepared to pay more for the rams they wanted”.
“It’s a good start to the selling season, but we’ve got a long way to go,” Mr Milne said.
He said good rainfalls had boosted producers’ confidence and hopefully a favourable season would help them rebuild flock numbers.
“That’s the only thing that is working against some ram sales in some areas – the volume of ewes is not there this year,” he said, adding that reflected past tough seasons.
“But good rams will sell well.”
