McCARTNEY’S of Kington report a smaller entry of 1172 sheep on January 14. We had an excellent trade in all weight ranges which would be one of the best for the week.

Hogget numbers marketed have been restricted during the week due to the wet weather taking its toll on the hoggets with farmers struggling to find hoggets fat enough to sell.

Hoggets: We had a smaller entry of 901 hoggets which sold to an excellent trade with all weights in excellent demand by the buyers.

The hoggets were in demand from the export and home trade buyers; we could have sold many more hoggets to a good price on the day.

The hoggets averaged an excellent £1.81ppk and sold up to £1.92ppk.

All the hoggets averaged a good £79 per head up to £91.80 per head for some 55kg hoggets from SI Rogers.

Hoggets between 32.5kg and 39kg averaged 1.75ppk up to 1.82ppk.

Hoggets between 39.5kg and 45.5kg averaged 1.82ppk up to 1.92ppk.

Hoggets between 46kg and 52kg averaged 1.77ppk up to 1.82ppk.

Hoggets over 52kg averaged 1.63ppk up to 1.68ppk.

We are fortunate to have excellent buyer support from 6 buyers giving excellent competition for the hoggets.

Cull ewes, tups, wethers, store lambs: There was a good entry of 332 cull and store sheep. The cull trade is generally easier every where this week due to larger numbers being marketed since Christmas.

We had a good trade overall in comparison to other centres this week.

The buyers are requiring meated ewes but not fat for their orders.

Best Texel ewes were a good trade selling to £105 per head from AM and RE Griffiths

Tups are still an excellent trade and have strong demand and sold up to £106 per head from WD Layton and Sons.

The ewes sold to a top of £105 and averaged a £58 per head which included smaller and thin hill ewes.

The cull tups sold up to £106 per head and averaged £82 per head.

Small store hoggets also sold to a strong trade and up to £54.

We have buyers requiring light hoggets each week to suffice their orders.

The cull ewe entry this week was very mixed with a large number of thinner mule ewes and smaller hill ewes.

We have buyers for in excess of 3000 hoggets and 750 cull sheep per week to meet our buyers’ requirements.

McCartneys at Kington, offer an on-farm livestock grading and marketing advice service on a free of charge basis.

Kington Market is every Thursday, commencing at 11am with lambs followed by cull sheep.

For further information please contact Gareth Wall on 01544 230316 or 0797414336.