Sellers still hold trump cards

THE change in the weather, with heavy week end rainfall, and an evening chill in the air as October dawned in the week after the Ploughing Championships brought all the ingredients of a testing time for farmers with beef cattle to sell.

But 2006 has already proved to be a year in which traditional patterns in the beef trade were not repeated. Once again this week, the normal seasonal trend and the weather challenge had no effect on the market, failing o dampen the confidence which strong prices have brought for cattle farmers.

Strong demand for cattle has continued, and farmers are maintaining a ‘hard sell” attitude which has ensured that prices have been fully maintained — and slightly improved in some areas.