It was anniversary sale time in Gortatlea Mart last week, where 520 cows went through the ring on Thursday last.
Trade caught fire, with exceptional demand throughout the sale.
A good number of dry suckler cows sold for close to or in excess of a €4,000, with prices ranging from €3.85/kg to €4.10/kg paid out at the upper end of the market and a shade more on occasion.
Most beef-cross animals sold for between €3/kg and €3.50/kg, with some older cows making back to €2.90/kg.
While suckler cows grab the headline prices at sales, trade for dairy dry cows was very steady throughout.
The vast majority of Friesian cows on offer sold for a range of €1,100 to €2,100, with a small number selling outside of that price bracket.
At the upper end of trade for them, well-fleshed Friesian cows were making from €2,300 to €2,500, with a top price of €2,780 paid for an 885kg Friesian (€3.14/kg).
It’s been a busy January when it came to the dry cow trade, with 1,600 cows sold across the Co Kerry mart’s three sales in the month.
Commenting that dry cows are among the easiest class of stock to sell at the moment, mart manager Maurice Brosnan said: “We had suckler cows making heifer prices of €4/kg.
“There’s good demand for mince and manufacturing beef and that means they’re easy to sell at the moment. If we had double the numbers, we’d sell them.
“There are plenty of cow buyers out there and we had a few of them down from the North, who were buying direct for slaughter.
“Despite the concern there is with bluetongue, it made no difference to demand from northern buyers, as we had five or six different buyers.
“You’re looking at €3/kg to €3.50/kg for good Friesian cows and for store Friesians, it’s about €2.50/kg to €3/kg for a good straight store cow.”
Despite the emergence of bluetongue, Brosnan is positive about the cattle trade for the coming months.
“There’s a little bit of uncertainty with bluetongue, but things look promising in my eyes. A lot of forward well-fed cattle came out over the last while, so we could see a shortage of grass cattle in a few months’ time.”
Gortatlea Mart saw well over 1,100 store cattle go through the ring the following day at the special sale of forward stores. It was what Brosnan described as the best yard of cattle he’s had since he opened his gates over a decade ago.
