WHILE averages were down compared to last year's spring sale, there was a lot of optimism for the the future from Yarram Park staff at their annual performance ram sale held at Hamilton Showgrounds on Tuesday.
New Yarram Park manager Craig Brewin said he accepted that prices would be cheaper.
"It started really strongly for us today and while top rams did sell well, we were expecting a few to be passed in today due to that adversity," he said.
"All in all, we had some good support from previous clients and a couple of new ones here today, and there are rams which people can have later on as well, they aren't going anywhere."
He said he always took a long-term approach and had looked at bringing the rams' size and weight down a little bit.
"It's been a brilliant season, with a great early Autumn break and it rained enough through winter to fill dams and then it dried out enough to let the grass grow."
"You couldn't ask for much more season wise."
Mr Brewin also said the "future looked bright" for Yarram Park and adversity in the sheep market would be short lived.
"We are trying to not be too reactive to the market to change breeding in the sheep for wool or meat."
"Yarram Park has got a type in the maternal sheep now, and it's a good type, and we get to measure it on a big scale too, which I think helps a lot."
The stud offered 200 rams all up with the 100 maternal rams for self-replacing flocks selling to $3500 a head and averaging $1385.
The buyer of the top lot, Lot 46, was the Goldsworthy family, Mortlake.
That ram was sired by Cloven Hills 202389 and had post-weaning eye muscle depth of 1.59 millimetres and a Maternal Carcase Production Plus index in the top ten per cent of the flock at 167.87.
It also recorded a post weaning weight of 16.03 kilograms which was within the top 5pc of the flock.
Maddie Goldsworthy said she was looking for a reasonably bare breeched ram with good figures.
"We are hoping for it to go and join some specially selected composite that we've been breeding on Yarram Park bloodlines for a fair few years now," she said.
She said recent rain earlier this month in their region wasn't quite enough to finish spring off but she was "happy to get whatever they can".
"We did have a wet winter and a big rain of 150 millimetres that came through in April, but it has dried up fairly quickly," she said.
The largest volume buyer of the day was Highbanks Pastoral, Young, NSW, who bid competitively buy 22 rams for an average of $1100.
Aramis Trust, Gatum and the White family, Normans Lake, WA bought the top priced terminal rams, Lot 133 and 107 respectively, each for $2000.
Sybil and Matthew Burmeister, Mt William Pastoral, Willaura, bought four terminal and 12 maternal rams, while Aramis Trust was also bought seven terminal rams.
