North-type Blackface rams met a strong trade at the Perth Ram Society sale at United Auctions, Stirling, with prices peaking at £22,000 and averages up.
Making top price was the best from Tom, Mairi and Robert Paterson’s Craigneich flock, based at Muthill, Crieff. A record price for the flock, which carries 400 North ewes and 1,300 South-type, this shearling ram is by a £5,000 Hillhead of Morinsh ram bought at Stirling two years ago. Out of a ewe by a £500 Auchnacloich, he sold to David Ballie, Calla, Carnwath.
The Patersons sold another by the sire at £11,000 to J Hunter, Glenarm, Co Antrim, and Bert Grant, Glendamph, Glenisla. The dam is by a £5,500 Viewmount sire.
Stephen Duncan, Achdregnie, Glenlivet, enjoyed a steady trade, selling to a top of £7,800, for a shearling son of a 5,500gns Conway Bros tup bought in 2018. Out of a ewe by a £3,000 Calla, he sold to the Conway Bros in Northern Ireland.
Another from Achdregnie, by the same sire, made £3,200, to WG MacPherson, Blackford, Croy, while the Hamiltons from Woolfords, Cobbinshaw, paid £3,000 for one from the same pen, as did W Stewart, Bomakelloch, Drummuir, jointly with the Shearers at Hillhead of Morinsh.
Best for the Hamiltons’ Woolfords shearlings was £6,000 from five Northern Ireland buyers. Overall North-type champion at the Blackface virtual show, which took place through the summer, this son of a Harkin ram is out of a ewe by an 11,000gns Breslin.
Cadogan Estates’ Auchnacloich consignment, from Amulree, peaked at £3,200 for a shearling son of a £4,200 Craigneich, out of a ewe by a £4,000 Newmill of Inshewan. He sold to W and G Watson, Corain, and Tom Adams, Ballymena.
Leading the lamb trade at £8,000, were the Shearers’ 450-ewe flock at Hillhead of Morinsh, Glenlivet. Making their flock’s best ever price for a lamb, this one is by a £3,800 Achdregnie.
The Kydds at Glenhead, Glenisla, paid £2,800 for a Calla lamb by the 5,500gns Conway sire, while Sandy and Steven Smith, Scar Hill, received £2,200 for a lamb by a 1,600gns MacAvoy sire, to Northern Ireland. Also at £2,200 was the top lamb from Doldy Farms’ Eastmill consignment, a son of an £8,000 Woolfords, which went to Billy Grant, Northern Ireland.
South-type ram lambs peaked at £20,000 from John Murray, Crossflatt, Muirkirk. A son of the £150,000 Auldhouseburn ram, this one went to two Northern Ireland buyers, Jimmy McCurdy and Colin McAteer. South shearlings sold to £10,500 to Alan Smith, Wester Crosswood Hill, West Calder. Sired by a home-bred son of a £5,000 Burncastle, he went to Jen Craig, Normangil, Crawford.