Jersey Ontario hosts online sales: New platform will allow members to host sales from their farms

GUELPH — Cattle sales are often as much get-togethers as anything else, with coffee and conversation on the table. Moving them online in the age of COVID-19 lockdowns was a gamble that paid off. So much so that Jersey Ontario decided to do it again.

Building off the success of sales like the Ontario Invitational Sale in the late spring that was a rip-roaring success, the breed association held another last month. The SNF Buster Sale was meant to help new and established producers fill a two per cent quota increase as well as the December incentive days, and get them ready for an upcoming change in February on milk ingredient pricing.

In total, 30 buyers turned out (online), about half the typical turnout of the Invitational Sale, for 30 lots. The sale averaged $2,024 per cow, about $450 lower than the Invitational Sale’s average.

The top-seller was RJC Colton Imagery, consigned by Robert Jarell Farms at Corbyville, Belleville. Imagery sold for $2,800 to Markus and Brenda Lothmann at East Garafraxa, Dufferin County.

Jersey Ontario is a regular sale host but this was the first that it hosted online through their new online auction service. But the organization doesn’t just plan to make use of it in the future for more flexibility in planning auctions; the plan is to also offer to members the ability to host their own production and dispersal sales.