Dalmally Shearling Sale 2021

DALMALLY SHEARLINGS

Averages:

467 shearlings, £1379.83 (+£60.34 for 49 more sold)

By Kathryn Dick

Blackface sheep breeders enjoyed a flying trade for shearling rams at Dalmally on Saturday 16th October, where a top price of £60,000 was paid for the pen leader from Jimmy and Donald MacGregor’s Dyke flock, based at Milton of Campsie.

With a busy ringside for the duration of the sale, Dyke’s first shearling in the ring was knocked down to Willie Dunlop and sons, Quintin and William, buying for their Elmscleugh flock, Dunbar.

Having already proven himself as a breeder back at home, this big boy is by the £17,000 Midlock ram purchased at Lanark in 2019, and out of a daughter of the home-bred Starbuck tup.

His twin brother made £5000 selling to Jack and Sheila Kay, Hartside, Lauder.

Allan Wight, son Allan and his son, Ben, Midlock, Crawford, also enjoyed a cracking sale selling their best at £48,000 in a three-way split to John and Iain Finlay, Blackcraig, Corsock; Andrew Kay and sons, Robert and Andrew, Gass, Straiton; and Archie and John MacGregor, Allanfauld, Kilsyth. A son of a £45,000 Nunnerie bought here in 2019 in partnership with Dalchirla and Dyke, he is out of a home-bred Hawkeye-sired ewe.

Midlock also received £15,000 from David Morrison, Dalwyne, Barr, for another by the £45,000 Nunnerie out of a £25,000 Elmscleugh-sired dam.

Ian Hunter’s Dalchirla flock, Crieff, sold to £35,000 for their No 5 shearling ram, Fury after the boxer, Tyson Fury. Sired by the same tup that bred the 2020  Dalchirla £200,000 ram lamb, he is by a home-bred son of Dalchirla Boris. He sold to Ewen Macmillan, Lurg, Fintry, with Robert Cockburn, Hill of Errol, Perth, taking a half share.

Dalchirla also had a cracking day with sons of the £45,000 Nunnerie shearling selling at £14,000, £10,000, £6500 and £5000.

Dearest was the No 2, bred from a ewe by Boris – a home-bred son of a £10,000 Nunnerie. He sold to Willie and Billy Graham, Craigdarroch and Una Hodge, Kirkland, both Sanquhar.

Mr Hunter’s pen leader brought out with assistance of his brother Alan, made £10,000 to Glenmore Estates. His dam is by a home-bred son of a £68,000 Elmscleugh.

Willie and Ewan Bennie, Merkins, Gartocharn, also got in on the action, forking out £6500 for a another son of the £45,000 Nunnerie, out of a £24,000 Connachan daughter.

Gordon Pate, Moorfoot, Gorebridge, bought the No 3 Dalchirla shearling at £5000, which is also bred from a £24,000 Connachan-sired ewe.

Later in the day, Archie and John MacGregor, Allanfauld, sold their best at £12,000 to Iain Campbell, Glenrath, Peebles. A son of a £3500 Dalchirla ram purchased here in 2019 that bred last year’s £80,000 Allanfauld lamb, he is out of a £25,000 Crossflatt daughter.

Robert Cockburn, Hill of Errol, was another in the money, taking £11,000 from John Marshall, Gosland, Biggar, for a son of the £1200 Nunnerie ram bought at Lanark in 2019. He is out of a ewe by a £1000 Midlock ram.

Top price for Billy and Andrew Renwick’s Blackhouse flock, Yarrow, was £7000 paid by Burncastle Farming Co, Lauder for a shearling son of their £48,000 tup sold in 2020 at Lanark. He is bred from a daughter of a £25,000 Elmscleugh.

Elmscleugh sold to £6500 for a son of a £21,000 Auldhouseburn bought here as a lamb. Hugh Rorison, Clonrae, Thornhill, Dumfries, was the final bidder on this entry bred from a ewe by a £5500 Loughash.

The Dunlops also received £5500 from the Taylor family, Dall, Killin, for a son of a £45,000 Midlock, bred from a grandson of £160,000 Dalchirla on the maternal side.

Ewen Macmillan’s Lurg flock sold his best at £6000 – son of the £3200 Midlock bought as a lamb at Lanark, out of a daughter of Gass Bulletin – to John and Patrick Harkin, Loughash.

Four shearlings sold for £5000 with the first deriving from Duncan MacGregor’s Burnhead flock, Queenzieburn. Sired by a tup called Timmy – a home-bred son of a £18,000 Crossflatt – he is bred from a £1000 Loughash daughter and was bought by Malcolm Coubrough, Hartside farms, Lamington.

Mary McCall-Smith’s Connachan flock, Crieff, also hit £5000 when selling a son of the £6000 Elmscleugh to North Amulree, Tay and Torridon Estates, Balbeggie, Perthshire.

Eoin and Kirstyn Blackwood, Dalblair, Muirkirk, received the same money from Tom and Mairi Paterson, and son, Robert, Dunruchan, Muthill, Crieff, for a home-bred son of Dalblair Bodyguard, out of a daughter of the £52,000 Crossfatt ram.

Burncastle Farming, sold the last of the £5000 lots, a son of the £42,000 Glenrath, out of an £11,000 Happrew daughter, to Glenrinnes Farms, Dufftown.

FLOCK averages: