STELLAR prices paid at the Camperdown F1 heifer sale on Friday reflected the excellent returns producers were getting for vealers and culled cows.
No one has ever had prices like this.
- Graham Sutherland
The average price paid for joined heifers was $1733 and $865 for unjoined.
The top price was $2100 a head, which went to Malcolm Alexander of South Purrumbete for his Angus Friesian cross heifers.
Camperdown Stock Agents association president Phil McVilly said average prices this year were up about $600 a head on last year.
About 950 heifers were yarded for the sale, down from the 1390 penned last year.
Other best prices for joined heifers were:
Charolais Friesian cross, $2025,C&D Baxter of The Sisters; Murray Grey Friesian cross, $1725, R&M Leishman, Cobden; Hereford Friesian, $1720, Warrumyea Rise, Panmure.
Best prices In the unjoined heifers were; Angus Friesians, $1310, Wire Lane Holdings near Camperdown; Charolais Friesians, $1200, Ambleside, Pirron Yallock; Hereford Friesians, $1160, Devondale Farms, Gellibrand,
Graham and Merilyn Sutherland of “Melrose” at Warrion near Colac gained $2000 a head for 22 two-and-half-year-old Angus Friesan cross heifers joined to Mandayan Limousin bulls.
The heifers were due to calve within 10 weeks.
The Sutherland sold 108 cattle at the sale for an average of $1922, a 46 per cent increase on their last year’s average of $1320.
The prices were the best Mr Sutherland has received in his 45 years in the beef industry.
“No one has had prices like this,” He said.
However the stellar prices for joined heifers were an accurate reflection of vealer prices, which had jumped 40 per cent, Mr Sutherland said.
Stuart Jenkin from Landmark Leongatha was among those buying unjoined heifers for clients, paying between $1000-$1300.
They were being taken to Gippsland for joining.
Also buying was Geoff Turner of Larpent near Colac who bought seven Angus Friesian heifers due to calve in a few weeks for $1800 a head.
That price was a lot more than he paid last year but he was in the vealer business and needed to replace cows as they got older, he said.
John Daffy of Beeac paid up to $1900 a head but got others for $1250-$1330 to replace older cattle.