Camera at the Mart: prices soar in Skibbereen weanling sale

In the days of fairs, there was a saying – ‘drunk or sober, buy in October’.

While the fairs are long gone, the trade at Skibbereen Mart’s weanling sale on Friday last proved that old adage hasn’t been forgotten as farmers and exporters looked to stock up ahead of the winter.

Demand was such that all bar one of the 785 animals on offer at the west Cork venue were sold. A special weanling sale, it drew numbers out and prices from €5/kg to €7/kg were the going rate across the board for bulls and heifers of all continental breeds.

A share of traditional beef breed-crosses made over €5/kg, but most sold for between €4.30/kg and €4.90/kg.

Top price

Top price of €2,900 was paid for a 405kg Charolais-cross bull (€7.16/kg), while, for heifers, the sale topper was of the same breed, weighed 370kg and sold for €2,580 (€6.97/kg).

Exporters were fighting it out for the top-of-the-range continentals, while farmer demand drove the trade for store-type 2025-born calves.

Manager Keith Mullaney was in good form following the sale.

“There was no bother selling stock – we could have sold a lot more weanlings if we had them. The demand is savage.

“We had four exporters at the ringside and farmers were very active too.

“Some of those nice Charolais 300kg to 350kg are probably €200/head up since the start of the month.”

Vaccinating of weanlings has been in the headlines of late too and he said there has been a largely positive response to this.

“A good shot of farmers had weanlings vaccinated and in the last few weeks I’ve had more enquires from buyers looking for vaccinated animals to reduce their risks.

“I’ve had sellers too asking me what they should do about vaccination plans, so that’s a positive and there was a nice percentage vaccinated in the last sale.

“There’s more weanling properly too as the yard was a bit quieter.”