Fresh hope for battered industry (From Western Telegraph)

Fresh hope for battered industry

Demand for dairy bulls at the re-opened West Wales livestock markets this week has injected fresh hope into an industry forced to destroy these animals at birth.

The ban on live exports has left milk producers with only a limited market for their black and white bull calves.

But auctioneers Bob Jones-Prytherch and Co, operator of the marts at Carmarthen and Haverfordwest, reported good demand at their first live auctions in nearly a year.

Livestock director Huw Evans urged more farmers to bring these calves to the markets. Several entries sold at over £40 with sufficient demand to cater for more calves, he says.

Demand for black and white bulls confirmed what the auctioneers had felt for some time that disposal at birth was wasteful to the beef industry. The first market in Wales to re-open was Carmarthen on Wednesday with an entry of 20 freshly calved dairy cattle and 300 rearing calves.

The sale attracted an enthusiastic crowd of buyers from throughout Wales and across the English border.

A pedigree Holstein heifer bred by Messrs Thomas, of Foxhole, St Clears, went under the hammer for the top price of £900. Jeff Williams, of Hay-on-Wye, was paid £880 for a similar entry.

Bidding was also brisk in the cow section where a second calver from the Marshall herd at Ystradcorrwg, Rhydargaeau, was sold for £760.

Dealers and farmers packed the ringside to bid on the calf entry. The top price of £168 was paid to Ambrose Lewis, of Neudd, Meidrim, for a two-week old Limousin bull. Dairy farmer Mr Lewis, who sells around 60 calves a year, was relieved to see the markets re-open. He has suffered heavy losses since live auctions were banned. He estimates that, before Wednesday, he would have been paid under £100 for the same Limousin calf.

The re-opening of the marts is excellent news for me, he said. I chose to keep my calves and rear them to sell as weaners but even then I would have got a lot less than £168, he said.

At Wednesdays mart, a further ten calves sold for over £150.