Sale averages were very much on a par with 2021 at the opening sale of store lambs at Skipton Auction Mart, where a turnout of just shy of 4000 head levelled at £84.64 – down 68p on the same sale last year.

Topping the sale at £122 per head, was a pen of 10 Beltex crosses from the Brown family, Marske, Richmond, followed by £121 for for the first prize pen of 40, April-born Beltex cross lambs from Andrew Haggas, Grove Farm, Otterburn. Overall, Beltex lambs averaged just shy of £102 per head.

Just behind, on £118, were Beltex crosses from Michael and Elaine Dugdale, of Giggleswick.

Texel crosses peaked at £104 for the reserve overall pen of 50 from South Yorkshire’s Harold Smith, of Dunford Bridge, followed at £102 from Silsden's Phillip Sedgwick. Strong Texels were making £90 per head plus, with the section averaging £83.30.

Suffolk crosses also sold to three figures with a pen of 40 bred out of Welsh Mules, making £100 for Knaresborough’s Stephen Robinson with another similarly bred pen from the same home selling for £95.

Other Suffolk crosses from Michael Parker, Winterburn, achieved £98 and £97, with the breed average cashing in at £86.59.

Good, medium keep lambs were selling from the low to the high £80 per head, with a mixed trade seen for medium to long keep lambs, with some in the late £70s looking reasonable value to those with keep available, though a lack of grass countrywide proved a problem for this class of lamb.