NSA Ram Sale Round-Up
4th October 2022
It has been another successful year for the NSA Ram Sales. With a further ram sale added to the offering this year, all six sales, NSA Wales & Border Early and Main, NSA South West, NSA Eastern Rugby and Melton, and NSA South East sales welcomed familiar, well known and respected vendors as well as new faces offering quality stock to packed rings of bidders.
Catch-up on the highlights of this year’s NSA Ram Sales below.
NSA Wales & Border kicked off the 2022 sales with the early sale held on Monday 1st August 2022 at the Royal Welsh showground. The best tups sold well in a sale that defied fears over rising costs and slipping lamb prices. The sale saw a top price of 1700 gns for a Charollais ram from WC & RL Bowen, Haverfordwest. Closely followed by a yearling Texel which sold for 1600gns, from Watkins, Great Corras. Suffolk’s topped at 850gns sold by Paul Curran. A total of 243 sheep sold, 73% of the number forward Read the full report and download the sales averages here.
Two weeks later, the NSA South West Region Ram Sale was held at Exeter Livestock Centre on Wednesday 17th August. The auctioneers reported that buyers were looking for powerful, quality rams and were prepared to pay for them. Topping the sale at 2,100gns was the Texel show champion – a shearling ram from Phil and Lesley Martyn-Uglow. A Suffolk ram lamb from Robert Hopper led the way in that ring with 2,000gns and the shearlings were topped at 1,300gns. Read the full report here.
The following Wednesday (26th August) saw the NSA Eastern Region Ram Sale, held at Rugby Livestock Market. There was a real buzz at the NSA Eastern Region Rugby Ram Sale, with a packed ringside of eager buyers, mainly local, which ensured a tremendous trade throughout the day. A smaller entry than previous years, but the quality forward was very good. The ram sale was topped by Garfield Stephens of Melton Mowbray, with one of his Texel Shearling Rams at £1050. The full report can be found here.
September brought the inaugural NSA South East Region Ram Sale incorporated within Thame Farmers Market breeding ewe sale on Friday 2nd September. 81 Shearling & Ram Lambs were offered to a packed ring of potential buyers, 62 rams found homes to average £498.00. Texel Shearlings topped the sale at £960.00 from local breeders M & L Blakemore. Suffolk shearlings met strong demand topping at £900.00 for an April born shearling from Russo Suffolks, Norbury. Charollais shearlings sold to £740.00 from C W Thomas, Wolston. Click here to read the full report.
Next up was the NSA Eastern Region Ram Sale incorporated in the Melton Midland Sheep Fair on Friday 16th September. The sale saw a record-breaking number of entries and the quality of stock was evident for all to see with bidders having a good number of rams to select from with some well-known breeders putting forward some excellent pens from which to choose. Charollais shearling rams sold to the leading price of 1200gns from Messers Timm. Suffolk shearlings topped at 1100gns for Garner & Son, while the show of Texel rams were away to a high of 1000gns. Click here to view the show results and sale averages.
To draw the NSA Ram Sales to a close, NSA Wales & Border Main Sale was held on Monday 26th September at the Royal Welsh Showground. A strong sale of quality tups saw a Blue Faced Leicester shearling sell for a record 26,000gns just minutes into the bidding. It was quickly followed by a Texel that sold for 24,000gns. The top priced Charollais, a shearling, was sold for 3,800gns from Probert & Sons Mortimer Flock. The top priced Suffolk was sold from Glenys Morgan’s Llangeview Flock for 1750gns. Read the full report here.
NSA thanks all vendors, buyers and volunteers for making the sales a huge success and wish all buyers success with their next crop of lambs.
