LOCAL farming brothers Stuart and Stephen Lund, of West Farm, Litton, won the show class for Suffolk gimmer lambs at Skipton Auction Mart’s latest store lambs show day.

Their pen of 10, by tups from the Lawn and Reeday families in Skipton and Hetton, went on to sell for £92 per head. While running both Suffolk and Swaledale flocks, the Lunds’ main stock in trade are North of England Mules, with 300 on the ground currently, all hill-bred at between 1,000 and 1,950ft. They keep back the best for breeding, selling others at Skipton’s high profile NEMSA sales each autumn.

The main show classes were judged by Ripon’s Ben Ryder, a well-known commercial goat farmer milking around 500 currently. He also keeps North of England Mules and is now looking to diversify more into Suffolks, doing just that when himself claiming a pen of 10 from Silsden Moor’s Jeff Throup at £88 each. Masham wether lambs were also out in force and the annual prize show for pens of 40 or more fell for the third year in succession to K Lister and Sons, of Kiln Hall, Kettlewell, who received the Craven Cattle Marts Cup and saw their charges sell at £69 per head. Bolton-by-Bowland father and son, Roger and Jason Craddock, sent out the first prize pen of Continental gimmer lambs, near pure Texels, also for the third consecutive year, though these returned home.