Factories continue to light up the mart trade, with some very anxious factory agents sourcing cattle for factories this week.

The tension is high, with agents under big pressure to secure daily numbers of finished cattle for their factory groups.

This has erupted around the ringside on a number of occasions over the last seven days, with one auctioneer in the northern half of the country telling two buyers who began to exchange unpleasantries around the ring “calm down, he’s only a bullock boy, there’s a couple of hundred of them to come in yet”.

Some agents in the south of the country have resorted to buying cattle in the 400kg to 500kg weight range such is the demand.

These cattle would usually be headed to a factory feedlot for a 60- to 90-day finish, but the Christmas bells are ringing and factories have upped their capacity to fill contracts over the next six weeks.

Lighter Friesian bullocks also continue to be in demand, with Kilkenny auctioneer George Candler commenting that Friesian bullocks were up again this week, with some of the better types crossing the €2.60/kg barrier.

Lesser types were being bought from €2/kg to €2.30/kg this week. Live exporters continue to rule the roost when it comes to good continental store cattle, with big activity taking place in live exporter yards this week.

Some exporters have even expanded the number of yards they are operating out of, taking some big finishers out of the equation for finishing cattle for factories this winter, something I’m sure isn’t going down well in factory circles.

I’m told that there are currently not enough livestock trucks in the country to cater for the demand that there is for roll-on roll-off exports and that lorries from northern Europe have been drafted in for the next few weeks to deal with the surge in exports.

The weanling trade also continues to drive on, with exporters also leading the charge in terms of buying weanlings, with red Limousin bull weanlings being in particular demand at the moment.

Martbids

Taking a look at this week’s Martbids analysis, we see that all cattle had a very solid week’s trading, with heavy bullocks seeing a big lift in price.

Top-end bullocks in the 600kg-plus weight category came in at €3.21/kg this week, up 17c/kg on the previous week’s trading.

Average-quality bullocks in the same weight category came in at €2.89/kg. Store bullocks also saw a positive week’s trading, with the average 400kg to 500kg store bullock coming in at €2.81/kg, 9c/kg higher than the previous week.

Heifers saw very little movement on the week, with top-end heavy heifers over 600kg coming in at €3.20/kg, unchanged from last week.

Heavy weanling bulls saw an exceptional week’s trading, with top-end bulls over 450kg up 28c/kg to €3.72/kg this week. Average bulls in the same weight category came in at €3.25/kg, up 19c/kg on last week. Top-quality weanling bulls in the 300kg to 400kg weight bracket came in at €3.85/kg this week.