Stock Report: April 3

By Stuart Sheldrake

THERE was a yarding of 1,300 cattle at the Scone saleyards yesterday, largely made up of vealers, weaner cattle and ligher calves once again, there were not a lot of feeder cattle on offer.

The best of the cows topped at $2.15 and plainer boner cows, which the majority of the cattle are, made between $1.40 and $1.85.

The butcher calves made $3.25 and the best of the heifer weaners made $2.92, with the majority making between $2.60 and $2.92; steer weaners made similar rates from $2.75 to $3.05.

Cattle numbers have pulled up a bit, our weaners are all gone and there are just a few calves still coming, generally off irrigation country.

We expect numbers to be from 700 to 1,200 for the time being.

During the winter months we expect things to be quiet, because people haven’t been able to put cattle away that would normally go onto crop or feed cattle because the market isn’t quite there at the minute.

A lot of the cattle have left the area and those cattle take three to five months to fatten, especially on grain, those cattle now we will miss in June, July and August.

At this point in time it’s going to be a tough winter for a lot of people.

Especially the people to the east who missed out on the rain, they have no feed and then they’ll start getting frosts which will kill off what is there.

A place that might usually run 500 cows, they are now back to say 200 cows; so they’d normally sell 500 calves, but will now only sell 200 calves next year.

There were people who did get some rain a couple of weeks ago; Merriwa had a good go of it and it was good to see Bunnan and those places get a bit, which was doing it very tough, but in parts they got four to six inches so that will help those fellas, especially if they got their oats in which I think a lot of them did.

At least they will have some feed during the winter, but to the east things there are a few patches that missed out and they are the ones that will be in for a torrid time in a few months time.

We expect things to be quieter than usual.

Read the full report from Meat and Livestock Australia: Scone Cattle Market.