Michelle Anderson’s Red, father of Dewi Jenkins’ 8,500gns Skipton top price. Image – Adrian Legge Photography.

Dewi Jenkins with his 8,500gns top price Skipton dog, Graylees Rose. Image – Adrian Legge Photography.

SHEEP dogs sold for up to A$16,390 at the latest Skipton Auction Mart spring sale in Britain recently.

Welsh sheep handler, Ceredigion’s Dewi Jenkins, who is currently producing some of the most sought-after and best-selling working sheep dogs in Britain, topped the May 17 sale at £8,925 or A$16,390 with his 13-month-old red and white bitch, Graylees Rose.

It was the highest price ever achieved at Skipton by Mr Jenkins, who is a well-known trialler who farms Welsh Mountain ewes and Welsh Black cattle at Tynygraig Farm, Tal-y-bont, Aberystwyth.

Rose is by Michelle Anderson’s Red and was purchased as a youngster by Mr Jenkins from the Northumberland handler and trialist, who runs a Cheviot sheep flock on her 1,300-acre hill farm in Bellingham.

The dam is Glan y Gors Peg, owned by fellow Northumberland shepherdess, near neighbour and good friend, Emma Gray, the reigning English Nursery Champion, who farms at Harwood Forest, Morpeth.

Emma hit the headlines at Skipton’s previous fixture in February when establishing a new world record price for a working sheep dog bitch at an official sale of 14,000 guineas (£14,700 or about A$27,000) with her two year-old tri-coloured bitch Brenna, sold to an American buyer.

At the same 2019 opener, Mr Jenkins, whose previous top price at Skipton for a dog was 8,100gns – achieved exactly a year earlier – made a combined 15,200gns (A$29,307) for two well-bred bitches, believed to be a Skipton record for a brace of bitches sold at a single sale.

His latest 8,500gns dog, thought an excellent nursery prospect, found a new home in Scotland with John S. Hastie, of Fife, a retired shepherd/stockman who still keeps a few sheep and will use Rose for work and trial. Several lots later, he himself sold a June, 2016, black and white bitch, Jess, at 1,050gns.

Michelle Anderson bought Red as a ten-week-old pup and trained him to become her first trials dog, winning an open novice trial and also with placings in open trials.

“He is now our main work dog, strong and powerful with a fantastic temperament. I’ve been running Red in the Northumberland League and he is very well-known in this part of the world.

“He’s standing at stud and has been registered as a stud dog with the International Sheep Dog Society (ISDS). He can literally move mountains!” Michelle said.

Second top price of 6,400gns (A$12,341) was paid for a superbly bred young tri-coloured bitch from a first-time vendor at Skipton, David Murray, a Shetland Islands sheep farmer and trialler who had made a 14-hour boat trip, followed by a six-and-a-half-hour drive south to attend the UK’s leading sheep dog sales venue.

His eight-month-old Maid, who was placed fourth in her first nursery trial, is by twice Irish National champion and 2016 reserve supreme champion, James McLaughlin’s Dan, out of Seamus McManus’s Nell, whose own dam is Littledale-based Ricky Hutchinson’s celebrated International Reserve Supreme Champion, Sweep.

Mr Murray has a flock of Shetland-Cheviot crosses and has won Scottish trials, as well as running in the Scottish National. Maid was keenly contested and returned north of the border with Ewen Macmillan, of Lurg Farm, Fintry, who was present in person on the day and successfully fought off strong competition from a US phone bidder.

A total of 20 dogs sold up to 1500gns,(A$2893) with 15 more making 1,600-2000gns and a further 20 selling at between 2100gns and 3000gns.

The spring sale attracted another solid turnout of 137 dogs – 96 field-run dogs and 41 in the unbroken pen. Craven Cattle Marts’ general manager and auctioneer Jeremy Eaton said there were plenty of opportunities for purchasers to acquire both respectable field-run dogs at 1500-2000gns and promising youngsters in the unbroken to bring on to run in trials.

Prices and averages: Broken dogs – 24 registered dogs from 600gns to 3400gns (av £2,067), 32 registered bitches from 400gns to 8500gns (av £2,302), 5 unregistered bitches from 600gns to 2050gns (£1187). Part/unbroken dogs – 19 registered dogs from 250gns to 1400gns (av £525), 16 registered bitches from 200gns to 1600gns (av £677).

Skipton’s next working sheep dog sale is the summer fixture on Friday, July 5. Entries close on June 21.

Source: Robin Moule, Moule Media.