Lamb prices recovered slightly this week in the live ring as the average for mediumweight lambs rose £6-£7/head. Meanwhile, the deadweight market for cattle continues to pay £3.68 to £3.80/kg for R grade continental steers under 400kg.

The official Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board (AHDB) steer price was £3.89/kg for an R4L for the week ending 3 October, a second week in a row at this price. Heifers grading R4L were quoted at £3.87/kg, which is down 1p/kg. Same grade bulls were £3.74/kg which is up 1p/kg. Cows grading O-4L dropped 2p/kg to £2.65/kg - the sixth week in a row the price has dropped.

As the weather changes across Scotland and cattle start to be housed, the number of store cattle sold rose by 21% to 10,025 with an average of £909/head.

Mediumweight prime lambs in the live ring rose by 14p/kg to £1.97/kg recovering much, but not all, of the previous week’s sharp fall. Heavier lambs also bounced back 9p/kg to £1.88/kg. There were 1,000 fewer prime lambs sold with 23,001 going through marts.

The live ring sold similar numbers of ewes to the previous week, with an average price of £59.36/head, a fall of £2.41/head

The official AHDB lamb price for last week was £4.36/kg for an R grade - a fall of 16p/kg on the previous week. However Scottish farmers are reporting abattoir prices of £4.40/kg for R grades under 21kg.

The live ring sold similar numbers of ewes to the previous week, with an average price of £59.36/head, a fall of £2.41/head.

Store lamb sales dropped by over 20% to 17,034 with an average liveweight price of £59.88/head, representing a drop of £2.56/kg.

Meanwhile, the AHDB reports that heifers make up 41% of the GB kill, which is the highest since records began in 1986. Typically, the amount of heifers in the kill is around 37%, but it has been climbing for two years. From January to August this year, 545,000 prime heifers were slaughtered. This has been put down to a contracting suckler beef herd which shrank 4.5% between 2017 and 2019. This means that fewer heifers are needed as replacements.

With fewer males to go into the food chain, the proportion of heifers has risen

The other factor is the increase in sexed semen resulting in fewer males being born in the dairy herd. With fewer males to go into the food chain, the proportion of heifers has risen. In the year ending March 2020, over 50% of the semen purchased was sexed, up from 32% in the previous year.