The Mayo Mule and Greyface Group held its premier show and sale last week, with a new format of ewe hoggets sold on Friday and ewe lambs on Saturday.

Group chair Joe Scahill says the group were relatively happy with the trade: “It has been a tough year for all farmers, with higher bills in spring and more recently during the drought. Taking this into account, we were pretty happy with the sale and it also offered reasonable value for customers.”

The average price for 1,050 hoggets reduced by €15 to €162. Top-quality hoggets sold from €180 to €200, with a few lots above this, while medium-quality lots ranged from €150 to €170. Some hoggets showed weather effects and there were a higher number of lighter lots in the €130 to €150 bracket. Some of these went unsold, which contributed to a clearance of 81% .

The average price of €121 for ewe lambs was €10 lower than 2017. There was a good entry of ewe lambs fit to breed this year, which ranged from €115 to €130, with many producers’ top pens rising to €140 to €150. There were several pens above this, with the two top-priced pens at €230 and €225. Medium-weight lots sold from €100 upwards. About 200 lambs sold from €80 to €100 and a similar number of mainly lighter lambs were not sold, with an 87% clearance rate of 2,500 lambs offered. The next Mule sale of 450 hoggets and 1,400 ewe lambs is on Saturday 8 September.