THESE last few weeks are probably the busiest time of the year for our sales teams as they travel the length and breadth of the nine sale centres.

The sales at the end of September saw the second round of some of the pedigree sales for the Texels, Blue Texels, Beltex and Badgerface sheep.

In the same week we held the main breed sales for the Lleyns, Roussins and Hampshire Downs.

Heading up the prices through these sales saw the Lleyns top at 7000gns, Beltex at 6500gns, Texels up to 3600gns, Blue Texels at 3000gns, Badgerface Texels to 1800gns, Roussins to 1000gns, Hampshire Downs at 1000gns.

The following week, we headed into early October and started with the first autumn pedigree beef sales with six breeds coming under the hammer.

Taking the top price of the day were the British Blues at 6600gns, Charolais sold to 3500gns, Aberdeen Angus were up 3000gns, Herefords topped at 2600gns, Shorthorns to 2200gns and Blondes were up to 2000gns.

The second week of October at Borderway hosts the Bluefaced Leicester premier sale when a catalogued entry of nearly 1000 head are offered for sale. The crossing type ring saw the top price of the day at £12,000 for a lamb ram.

The main autumn sale for the Limousin bulls has just been held and securing the top price of the sale at 35,000gns was the March 2019 born entry, Ampertaine Punch, consigned by regular Northern Ireland breeder James McKay.

Across some of our other centres, we have seen noted sales taking place which have included the renowned Herdwick ram sale at Broughton.

Taking the lead price this day was a 2 shear ram at 4800gns. Lockerbie Mart hosted the noted South Country Cheviot ram sale and a tremendous clearance was achieved with over 300 rams selling to level out at a record average of nearly £1,300. The top price on the day was £16,000.

The dairy sales team are busy with various dispersal and reduction sales and look forward to more sales booked into the sales diary up until the end of the year. Trade still continues to be buoyant and demand for numbers are rising on a weekly basis.

The trend of Online Bidding through the Machinery sales continues to be a positive marketing tool.

We continue with our monthly sales at present and into the turn of the year. This method of selling is attracting new interest as we have upcoming sales to be announced over the next few months.

We also continue to hold Online Timed Auctions for livestock and have recently completed the first ever sale for the Irish Moiled Cattle Society. This was a new venture for both parties and a fantastic clearance prevailed and a leading price tag of 6700gns was achieved for a mother and daughter outfit which sold to establish a new herd in Ayrshire.

I cannot dismiss the continual guidelines we have to continually observe whilst we operate the sales throughout all the centres. At present these will continue to be with us and we thank all customers for working with us and assisting us to keep the livestock markets open.