THIS year started with a new all-time record being set at Holsworthy Market for prices of stock in the cattle auction.

In one of the most successful prime cattle auctions ever seen at Holsworthy, a price of 176 p/pkg was achieved for an outstanding Devon X heifer produced by Dave Colwill on his North Tamerton farm. This broke a record which had stood for some 30 years and followed ferocious bidding from the large number of buyers standing around the auction ring.

Mr Colwill's heifer was amongst a whole series of animals which topped the £1,000 mark at Wednesday's auction with buyers travelling to the ever-popular Holsworthy auction site from as far away as Buckinghamshire and Swindon.

It was a similar story in the sheep pens where Kivells' auctioneer, Steve Prouse saw a large January entry of over 1,100 sheep go under the hammer and no less than 25 pens of lambs achieved in excess of the £75 mark. Yet another new market record was set for a January auction with £82 given for a pen of outstanding lambs from Rex Bluett of Marham­church.

Speaking after the auction, senior cattle auctioneer, David Kivell, said: "We are very pleased to see all of our customers going home extremely happy and what a fantastic start to the new year. With the current exchange rate of the pound against the euro, export prices are looking good and all is set for a successful winter for the farming community."

These unprecedented prices come on the back of a new study carried out by the Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board which shows that, in 2008, over 6.9 million prime lambs were sold through livestock auctions compared to 5.4 million in 2007 — an increase of 27.8 per cent on the year.

The study also showed that over 370,000 finished cattle and 174,000 cull cows were sold through livestock markets in 2008, which is 40 per cent higher than the 2007 average.

Chris Dodds, Executive Secretary of the Livestock Auctioneers' Association, said: "These figures clearly tell us all that farmers in Great Britain see the auction market system as a vital tool to their marketing options with the live auction being the only available forum where live, open, transparent and competitive trade can be brought together in one place."

Kivells auctioneers, who run livestock markets at Liskeard, Hallworthy and Holsworthy, have themselves seen a fantastic increase in annual turnover in 2008 compared with 2007 in their livestock auction sales and are very confident that even greater numbers will be bought and sold in this way in the future.

See the Post for the monthly Farming Diary coming soon.