DESPITE dry conditions, repeat buyers were in strong support of the 19th annual on-property GullenGamble sale at Yeoval on Tuesday.
One hundred and fifty one rams sold of the 170 on offer for a 89 per cent clearance, top of $6000 and an average of $2067.
GullenGamble owners Mark and Kym Kerin, their daughter Laura and husband Zac Hartin, chose to donate the total proceeds of Lot 5 to the Nepean Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) at Penrith.
This follows the birth of Zac and Laura’s son, Jock, who was born 25 weeks and five days premature on April 20 weighing only 912 grams.
Since his birth, he has been in the NICU and Laura has been staying at the Hope Cottage for rural families. Now five months old, Jock weighs 4.4 kilograms.
Purchased by Uungula Pastoral Company, Wellington, the donation lot raised $4500 for the cause. Donations were also taken on the day to raise a total of $5000 to go to the NICU at Penrith.
The top priced ram, GullenGamble S161498, was purchased by Don MacDonald, MacDonald Grazing Company, Molong, for $6000.
The sale topper was by the WP syndicate, had a body weight of 95 kilograms, measured 20.6 in the micron, 2.5 standard deviation, 12.2 pc fibre diameter coefficient of variation and 99.8 pc comfort factor.
Mr MacDonald said the ram was selected for his beautiful bone structure, correctness, beautiful white wool and soft skin.
“He had particularly good figures for greasy fleece weight, eye muscle depth and fat depth,” Mr MacDonald said.
“The ram will go out west and be joined to our ewe hoggets.”
The second top priced ram sold for $5500 to Avoca Grazing, Baldry, through Greg Sawyer from Australian Wool Network.
The GullenGamble 160106 ram by WP 140368, was in the top 20 pc for yearling clean fleece weight (YCFW) and yearling weight (YWT). He had a YCFW of +24.2, YWT of +8, +0 for yearling fat (YFAT), +0.3 for yearling eye muscle depth (YEMD) and 156.7 dual purpose indexes (DP+).
Mr Sawyer said he purchased the ram for his client who likes high DP+.
“The ram has a high YCFW and high YW. He is one of the highest DP+ in the catalogue,” he said.
“Physically he provides all the attributes. They have been purchasing from Gullen Gamble for about 20 years,
“He is a good sire type with strong bone and good wool. He will be a good balance in the Avoca Grazing flock.”
Gullen Gamble Kerin said he was pleased with the sale and happy with repeat clients.
The sale was conducted by Elders, Dubbo, with Paul Dooley, Tamworth, as the auctioneer.
Full report to follow.
