A TOTAL of 213 cast sheep were sold at Skipton Auction Mart on Monday.

Cull ewes averaged £68.64 per head, up £5 on the previous week, with highs of £140.50 and £129.50 for Texel pens from John Mellin, of Hellifield. Cast rams averaged £45.71.

And a standalone show for cull cows saw the first prize beef-bred entry, a British Blue from Richard Maudsley, of Rathmell, sell at £1,364, with the runner-up, a Blonde from Barden’s John Fawcett, taking top price in class of £1,399, or 166.5p/kg.

Red rosette winner in the dairy-bred class was Martyn Jennings, of Cowling, with a black and white sold for a section high of £854.

A strong turnout of 67 cull cows sold to an overall average of £683.90 per head - an improvement on the previous week’s £626 - or 94.31p/kg, very similar on the week.

The same day’s weekly rearing calf sale attracted a 51-strong turnout, which met with a stronger trade than the previous Monday, as a number of new faces added impetus to the bidding. Continental-cross entries averaged £301.92 per head, native youngsters £236.67 and black and whites £69.71. A measure of the trade was that the average age of all calves sold was 38 days.

Richard Spence, of Sutton-in-Craven, topped with a strong Limousin bull calf at £450, with Continental heifer prices headed by Martyn Jennings, of Cowling, with a £360 British Blue-cross. The better end of the black and whites was hard fought over, as John Blackwell, of Gargrave, received the highest price of £165 for his Friesian entry.