Springvale North's biggest sale to date could have seen more rams added
Celebrating their 25th annual on-property sale, Springvale North Poll Merinos, Burra, offered their most rams ever.
Stud principals Alex and Peter Stockman offered and sold 120 paddock-reared Poll Merino rams, including some two-year-olds, giving their pastoral clients an opportunity to fill orders.
Peter said they could have comfortably added an extra 20 or 30 rams, but had those aside for additional sales following the auction.
"We are well on track to sell about 200 rams this season," Mr Stockman said.
Looking down the line-up, only one ram in the top 10 made less than $3000, with Lot 5 selling to a top of $6200 and $5200 was made twice.
Sired by a Springvale North ram, Lot 5 had a 19.6 micron fleece with 2.8 standard deviation, 14.4 per cent coefficient of variation, 99.7pc comfort factor, a greasy fleece weight of 124pc, as well as a 42 milimetre eye muscle depth and 7mm fat.
Purchased by long-time supporter Luke Sander (JW&LA&LJ Sander), Eudunda, who was joined by his wife Amy and eight-week-old son Hugo, the 117-kilogram ram is hoped to go out for two joinings this year.
"From the minute I got out of the ute and walked over to the shed, pen 5 and 6 popped, and once I had a closer look pen 5 certainly stood out, well and truly," Mr Sander said.
"He's got the boldness of crimp and rich white wool and he had a deep, deep barrel, wide right through and a good top line.
"He stood out straight away for me."
The Sander family has bought from Springvale North for many years.
"The wool just keeps getting better and better," Mr Sander said.
"Our wether lambs have got good growth rates, from weaning we took them out, fed them up this year and had some really good results. We didn't sell a wether lamb for under $300, which was really good.
"These rams will go home and in another month they will go out with the ewes for autumn-drop lambing and then we also do a spring-drop lambing, so they will be used twice," he said.
Overall, Springvale North offered and sold 112 rams in the main auction, to $6200, averaging $2113, plus an extra eight in a mini auction, which topped at $1900 and averaged $1613.
Rams were purchased by clients from across the Mid North, Kangaroo Island, pastoral country and east of Burra.
Volume buyers on the day included JM&JC Oates, Burra, buying 13 rams and averaging $1530; Windalle Station, Menindee, NSW, buying 12 rams, averaging $1733; and AD Hutchings & Co buying 10 rams, averaging $2050.
Mr Stockman was thrilled with the sale's outcome and said it was another great result for the team.
"To keep a bit of a lid on the average, we have done that and keep that value for money for our clients, we've done that," he said.
"We have a great loyal client base back again as well as about three new clients as well."
With good numbers already on the ground and coming through for next year's sale, Mr Stockman said they would again put more rams forward for buyers.
The sale was conducted by Nutrien, with auctioneer Richard Miller commenting on the value for money clients received.
"Last year's sale, they had quite a considerable increase on average, Peter and Alex were pretty keen to keep the value there and I think people got value all day," he said.
"We could have sold another 30 rams here today...there was consistency right throughout with the Springvale North sheep, so it's a credit to them.
"They were born in drought years these rams and they've come up well."
