Scottish lamb price in abattoirs has dropped to between £6.00/kg and £6.20/kg for R grading carcases up to 22kg.

But the live trade is up, with marts this week averaging over £2.80/kg liveweight.

The official Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board (AHDB) price for R3L lambs across the UK is £6.24/kg, which is down 9p/kg for the week ending 18 December 2021.

The cull ewe price in Scotland averaged £86/head for last week, down £5 for the 8,897 sheep sold.

Beef price unchanged

The beef price hasn’t moved this week, with most abattoirs paying between £4.05/kg and £4.12/kg for an R grading continental steer.

The AHDB beef price for an R4L steer is down 1p to £4.187kg.

Same-grade heifers were £4.18/kg, down 2p. The young bull price is £3.99kg deadweight, down 6p.

Cows grading O-4L were £2.81/kg, which is up 2p on the week.

Mart sales

Thainstone sold 250 store cattle, with steers averaging £2.27/kg, down 3p, and heifers £2.04/kg, down 10p.

United Auctions Stirling sold 244 store cattle, with steers averaging £213/kg, dairy steers £1.73/kg, heifers £2.12/kg and young bulls £1.89/kg.

Dumfries Mart held a store sale where steers averaged £2.14/kg and heifers £2.07/kg.

The top price on the day was £1,255 for a Simmental steer.

Cull cows in Scotland average £1.35/kg liveweight for beef-bred cows, which is down 1p on the week, and £1.05/kg for dairy-bred cows, which up 2p.

At Thainstone Mart, cull cows averaged £1.46/kg.

Beef finished cows averaged £1,261/head, feeding cows averaged £1,012/head and boning cows averaged £670. Cull bulls averaged £1,168.

United Auctions sold beef cows for an average of £1.29/kg and dairy cows for £1.08/kg.

Steers in the prime ring averaged £2.35/kg, down 5p, and heifers £2.38/kg, down 5p.

Lamb numbers down

According to DEFRA, 1,121,600 head of lambs came forwards during November, which is 11% lower than a year ago and 10% down on the five-year average.

Meanwhile, the ewe kill for the month was recorded at 87,300 head, down 22% on the year.

Sheepmeat production during the month totalled 24,700 tonnes, which is down 10% on the year.

Between June and November, 6.3 million lambs have come forwards, 13% lower than last year.

We would expect a bit of a year-on-year decline, as last year lambs were pushed forwards early ahead of the end of the Brexit transition period.

Crop sale

At Carlisle’s crop sale, mini hestons of wheat straw were selling at £90/t.