Cattle Sale

Traditional Farmer · Mar 6, 2022

About 3X the number of trucks and trailers yesterday for this time of year at the Saturday livestock market over in Harrisonburg VA.I took a couple pain in the rear buck goats over.Took almost 2 hours to get unloaded and when I left I'd guess the last truck in line was going to have a 3 hour wait.

Bruce from Can. · Mar 6, 2022

How far do you travel to your livestock sales barn? Can you take stick the night before? I am very fortunate to have the only livestock sales barn within probably 75 mile radius of my farm, only 2-3 miles away. I often, no nearly always take stick to the sales barn the night before. They start receiving around 4-5 pm , and receive stock all through the night. Large tractor trailer loads can roll in from a great distance and need to be unloaded well before sale time so the stick can drink relax and be processed for sale. The mornings are like you say, crazy . There are a half dozen shoots to unload at, some dedicated to sheep, goats and calves, others for large stock like cattle and horses. Saturday morning you will see every sort of method of hauling stock you can imagine. I have seen sheep and goats arriving in mini vans, or crates mounted on flat bed trailers. Farmers pulling livestock trailers with tractors, pickup/trailer combinations, pickups with racks, straight trucks all the way to pot trailers.
A trip to the sale barn can be entertaining. There are also venders outside selling foul , tools , produce , you name it.

Philip d · Mar 6, 2022

Sounds like a lot of fun! I miss going to sales but my check book doesnt

redforlife · Mar 6, 2022

What all do they sale there?? Surely not just goats.
I only have cattle. Closest sale barn to me (1/2 hour away) only sales cattle. Sale barns around here use to sale cattle and hogs either on the same day, or different days of the week. Since hog confinements took over the hog producing, that pretty much ended the auctioning of hogs. I only know of one sale barn that even sales hogs anymore.
There's a poultry sale about an hour away from me. They sale a little bit of everything at it. But nothing on a large scale. I have seen goats and donkeys at that sale. Maybe a bucket calf or two. I don't recall ever seeing any sheep at it.

Traditional Farmer · Mar 6, 2022

Almost all cattle is what they sell but have a decent goat market too.This sale barn as some call them is about 40 miles from my place and sells on Saturdays and there is another place across town that has a Thursday sale.There is a livestock market barn about 30 miles from me but I don't like it as well.The Winchester VA market is where I usually take goats but its about 90 miles and is on Mondays.Great goat and cattle market and I take in the Rural King at Front Royal and a couple other places so don't mind the trip.

caterpillar guy · Mar 6, 2022

Hardly any livestock here left to sell. Closest one is St.Louis or Manchester and I don't remember what they sell at Manchester anymore. Lake Odessa Not sure if that is still going or not. This is in MI there are others farther away yet.

4520BW · Mar 6, 2022

If you don't mind saying what are meat goats bringing in your area?

Traditional Farmer · Mar 6, 2022

I won't know until I get the check about mid week on these and they were old bucks.According to the market report paper VDACS sends out weekly young goats 40 to 80 lbs were
selling for $3.50 to $4.75 a pound.

Traditional Farmer · Mar 6, 2022

Fortunately for me there are still alot of small feeder operations here in the Shenandoah Valley and over in West Virginia and several good markets.I like the sales on Saturdays since a lot of the cattle operations are part time and the owners can only make it to sales on the week ends and the Mennonites aren't coming on Sundays and they make up a good percentage of buyers and sellers.

onefarmer · Mar 6, 2022

Lake O is still going. I get my calves over there. I sell at St Louis. And Manchester is still running. They partner with Sheridan Auction for monthly consignments.

john in la · Mar 6, 2022

We use to have 3 sale barns in my parish (county) Wednesday; Thursday; and Saturday.
Far as I know only one is open now.
They moved the Thursday sale to every Tuesday and have a sale on some Saturdays

These sold yesterday but I do not have the report yet to see what they sold for.

fixerupper · Mar 6, 2022

The sale barns within driving range of me arr 35, 50 and 90 miles away. There is another one 25 miles away but they only do hay. We have more livestock area than we ever did before but almost none of it goes through sale barns. The sale barn in Nebraska dad liked sold up to 4000 head of cattle every week during the feeder cattle season 50 and more years ago. Today they have a sale only every other week and those sales are small. The feeder cattle now are going straight from the ranch to the feed lots instead of going through the barn.

Cattle Sale

Traditional Farmer

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Bruce from Can.

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Philip d

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redforlife

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Traditional Farmer

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caterpillar guy

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4520BW

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Traditional Farmer

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Traditional Farmer

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onefarmer

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john in la

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fixerupper

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