I heard a quote during the week – “They’d take your granny this week if you had a blue card for her” – and it sums up the beef trade well.

Factories are very anxious for cattle and it’s reflective in the quotes. Heifers are now at €3.70/kg, with more going for regular suppliers with numbers. In-spec steers have also moved on to €3.65, with talk of quotes going to €3.70 next week.

Finished cattle are scarce and its left procurement managers more active in the last week. Angus cattle are still being particularly sought after with bonuses of as high as €0.20/kg on top of in-spec bonuses.

Some large winter finishers closely aligned to a few factories haven’t restocked after a very difficult spring and that’s leaving numbers tight on the ground.

Grass is growing again and farmers are in no panic to sell. Some processors are still trying to hold base quotes at €3.60/kg, but the advice here is to bargain hard when selling stock.

The bull trade has moved on in line with steer and heifer quotes.

R grading bulls are now trading at €3.60/kg with U grading bulls at €3.70/kg. Under 16 month bulls are still in short supply and trading off a base of €3.60/kg.

Cows are also in demand, with €2.90/kg being paid for P+3 cows, €3.00 for O+3 and €3.20/kg to €3.30/kg being paid for good R+3 cows. Again, there is a large variation in prices and looking at agent activity in marts, farmers with one or two cows would make more money in the ring at the moment.

Demand remains strong in the North, with over 700 cattle moving north of the border last week for direct slaughter. I’m also told a number of the independent factories have a new contract for sending whole carcases north on a weekly basis.

Northern buyers are still very active around mart rings this week and 26, 150 cattle have been exported north in the period to the end of June 2020, up 8,890 head on the same period last year.

Last week’s kill remained above 37,000 head at 37,097. The young bull kill remains stable at 2,907, with an extra 259 cows killed in the last week.

There were 13,460 steers slaughtered last week, down 210 on the previous week, with 627 less heifers being slaughtered compared with the previous week.

IFA livestock chair Brendan Golden said: “Based on the major increase in cattle prices in our main export market in the UK in recent weeks, factories can pay a lot more. R3 steer prices in the UK are making the equivalent of €4.27/kg or a massive 47c/kg more than Irish prices.

“Finished cattle numbers have tightened dramatically this week. The shed cattle are more or less gone and there is an abundance of grass,” he said.

Northern Ireland

In Northern Ireland, the trade is generally steady, as processors look to keep a grip on prices. Base quotes are generally 364p to 366p/kg (€4.04 to €4.06/kg ex VAT) for U-3 grading animals.

Farmers selling young bulls are moving animals for around 368p/kg (€4.08/kg), with more on offer where carcase weights are being met.

Steers are moving from 372p to 374p/kg (€4.13 to €4.15/kg), with heifers making 2p to 6p/kg more for good-quality butcher-type animals. R grading cows remain on a base of 280p/kg (€3.11/kg), but deals of up to 320p/kg (€3.55/kg) are on offer for good-quality beef-bred animals.