All roads lead to Leongatha’s store sale

THERE were around 4000 cattle yarded at Leongatha’s VLE Saleyards last Friday, February 11, for the fortnightly store sale, which is about on par for these important sales through January and February.

And with prime cattle, up to 600kg or above in some cases, there were a variety of buyers present including those buying for the trade, exporters, feedlot operators from Victoria, NSW and South Australia, not to mention local agents and beef fatteners trying to pick up genuine store cattle for their local clients.

Terry Ginnane of Nutrien Leongatha said it was likely the feedlot buyers would dominate the sale but in a varied yarding of cattle, which included young cattle, dairy types and the best in prime stock, there was something for everyone.

“We’ve got some local orders but we’ve been buying some along the way, so I wouldn’t expect the get many today,” Mr Ginnane said.

“There are some cattle here today that could have been in on Wednesday but that’s the way it is at the moment.”

In fact, one local producer said some beef producers locally had taken to testing the market on store sale day, rather then send them in on trade cattle day, and were getting better returns in some cases.

Prices remained consistently good and are likely to stay that way with the export market solid and producers up and down the eastern seaboard still rebuilding herds.

A spokesman for one of the big Victorian exporters said their processing plant was operating at 64 per cent at the moment, restricting their buying and processing capacity, and while they anticipated this situation would improve as the present COVID-19 wave eased, there was still the issue of a lack of qualified workers.

“We’ll probably need to attract some employees from overseas, due to the shortage of qualified staff locally, in order to get back up towards full capacity.”

Agents and beef producers are managing the release of stock into the market very well, aided by the excellent season, which is likely to extend the availability of store cattle and prime stock beyond the usual January-February peak.

Prices continued to be good at Leongatha on Friday, some early quotes included:

• 14 black steers A Spencer, Leongatha (ave. 662kg) $2620 and 13 black steers (ave 627kg) $2620
• 6 black steers Colafella Farm, Moyarra (ave. 634kg) $2920
• 6 black steers T Dibianco, Buffalo (ave. 476kg) $2240 to Charlton Feedlot.
• 18 black steers Katelea Farm Glen Alvie (ave. 412kg) $2480
• 16 Friesian x steers PI Operations, Cowes (ave 441kg) $1650
• 13 Angus/Friesian x steers, Merve and Lisa Reilly, Hedley (ave. 344kg) $1660 to local fatteners.