FARM WEEKLY – by Mal Gill – “HARVEST cannot come soon enough for the Spark brothers, Michael and Peter, who farm at Dowerin and are looking to turn their Merino flock out onto stubble.
“We’re struggling for sheep feed at the moment,” Michael Spark said on a visit last week to Primaries of WA’s woolstore.”
FARM WEEKLY – by Mal Gill – “LEADING national wool indices higher last week, the Western Indicator (WI) finished back above the 1600 cents a kilogram landmark for the first time in a month.
It had last topped 1600c/kg clean on September 7, on its way down after breaking through the landmark barrier for the first time earlier this year and setting an all-time record of 1680c/kg on August 17.”
WESTERN ADVOCATE – “MONARO region farmer and merino stud wool producer, Charles Massy, will be launching his latest book, Call of the Reed Warbler, at Skillset’s Flannery Centre in Bathurst at 5pm on Wednesday.”
NZ FARMER – by Tim Cronshaw – “Crossbred wools still struggled as fine wool prices lifted at the Christchurch wool sale last week.
Results were mixed for a top offering from all wool breeds compared with the last sale on September 28 with core Asian markets subdued, including for crossbred hogget fleece.
Crossbred fleece 31 to 34 microns was 3-7 per cent cheaper, 35 microns and stronger was back 1-3 per cent and second shear unchanged.”
STOCK & LAND – by Joely Mitchell – “MELROSE
*47 of 49 Merino and Poll Merino rams sold to $3300, av $1644
CONTINUING what has already been a stellar ram selling season, Melrose Merino stud has recorded its best ever sale.”
NORTH QUEENSLAND REGISTER – by Bruce McLeish, Elders Northern wool manager – “ANOTHER solid performance at the wool auctions this week as early stage processors around the world kept orders flowing to keep their machinery busy.
Wool is moving rather reluctantly along the pipeline at present. However, the auction market is still performing very well in most sectors.”
STOCK & LAND – by Murray Arnel – “Although not hitting the extremes of other Riverina sheep sales no fewer than eleven sale lots of 2016-drop black-tag young ewes recorded prices above $200 and to a top of $230 a head at Deniliquin sheep breeders Merino and crossbred sale on Friday.”
SHEEP CENTRAL – “More buyers for fewer sheep and lambs boosted the on online clearance rate by almost 20 percent on AuctionsPlus last week.”
SHEEP CENTRAL – by Doug Laing – “Record breaking Australian-based New Zealand shearer Stacey Te Huia quickly recovered the cost of his latest trans-Tasman mission as he won a rare elite-level speedshear in Wamate last Friday.”
THE AUSTRALIAN – by Sue Neales, Reporter Rural/Regional Affairs – “When is a sheep a lamb?
And is all the $2.3 billion of lamb meat sold in our supermarkets and butchers’ shops every year — with each Australian consuming 9kg of juicy lamb chops or roast lamb — actually from young, frolicking lambs?
That is the conundrum confronting Australia’s 31,000 sheep and lamb farmers and Australia’s lamb-loving consumers.”
