Moyle Pathfinder Victorian bull sale is red hot

Lot one attracted fierce bidding and was bought by Frank and Andis Sorraghan for $21000, making equal top price in the sale.

Mr Sorraghan said he bought from the stud two years ago and was drawn to the bull's overall type.

The genetics would be used to continue improving his herd, which is based near Wagga Wagga in New South Wales.

Mr Sorraghan also bought a second bull for $7000.

Mooramook Pty Ltd purchased the other top priced bull later on in the sale.

Volume buyers included Andrew Graham from Alanvale Farms, who took home 11 bulls.

Mr Graham also purchased nine at Pathfinder's South Australian sale last week and was in the process of building a commercial herd.

"We're just after good average bulls with nice bits of depth and length about them," he said.

"We're starting out building a herd so we just want good quality, average bulls and that's what we found here today.

"We've been doing our homework over the last few months and we bought at Naracoorte last week and topped up again here."

He planned to have an autumn and spring calving, he said.

Stud principal Nick Moyle said it was an outstanding sale and he was very pleased with the result.

"It's the highest average we've had and with the same number of bulls," he said.

There had been three standout sires that had particularly good docility, structure and growth traits, he said.

"Genesis and Beastmode have been standouts for birth to growth and calving ease and we used Momentous in there to add some real carcase data," he said.

"It's been a really good combination for our lineup of bulls."

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Both top bulls were sired by Beastmode and the spring bull, bought by Mooramook Pty Ltd, was a fantastic type, he said.

"He's an absolute tank, he was 830kg at 17 months old and absolutely near perfect structure and near perfect temperament as well," he said.

He said it was good there were also plenty of bulls sold around the $8000 mark, which allowed buyers with smaller budgets to get involved.

It had been a terrific season with the stud receiving about 10 to 20mm a week up until mid-February, he said.

"We've been very fortunate to have a bit of green pick underneath and we haven't had to have any hand feeding yet and we probably won't for a fair while," he said.

Lead auctioneer Kevin Norris said he was over the moon with the result.

Mr Norris said he was expecting good prices following the results from Pathfinder's South Australia last week, but it exceeded expectations.

"It was a huge result on a very, very good draft of cattle," he said.

"I think the bulls this year were more even than they had been, the breeding program here has really come together.

"The average was over $4000 per head up on last year's average, which is a tremendous jump, but the cattle certainly warranted it and it was indicative of what the cattle market's doing."

Buyers came from King Island to Blayney in New South Wales and the Benalla area was also very strong, he said.

"There was obviously a lot of very good cattleman keen to get better quality bulls this year to reinvigorate their cows herds and to keep improving the maternal lines of the commercial herds that they operate," he said.

"They were prepared, after getting very good calf prices this year, to step into a higher grade of bulls and were prepared to pay for them."