AT the age of just ten years, young Charlie Leach from Calderdale is fast becoming an old hand in the livestock show arena with his championship-winning prime lambs, standing supreme champion for the second time at Skipton Auction Mart’s annual young handlers’ showcase. (Monday, August 14).

For Charlie, whose proud parents Adrian and Kathryn Leach farm at Owlers Farm, Hebden Bridge, was not only repeating his 2021 young handlers title win at Skipton - that came in the junior show class - but also following up on his young handlers championship success, again for the second year running, at the same venue’s high profile annual Christmas primestock show day last November.

The latest show victor for the Old Town Primary School pupil, this time on his debut in the intermediate class, was an April-born pure Beltex gimmer lamb by one of his parents’ tups out of Charlie’s own home-bred ewe. Tapped out first as 1st prize winner in the 10-16yrs show class, then overall supreme champion by Embsay show judge Annabel Mason, the 41kg frontrunner went on to sell for £150 to ringside regular Andrew Atkinson, Felliscliffe.

The reserve championship was awarded to the 1st prize winner in the Under 10s show class, Raff Middleton, nine-year-old son of Beamsley dairy farmers Alan and Emily Middleton. His home-bred 58kg Beltex-x-Texel wether lamb sold for joint top price in show of £200, a price matched by the runner-up in the same show class from Raff’s sister Martha with her 58kg Texel lamb. Both again fell to Mr Atkinson.

After finishing runner-up in the intermediates class the previous two years, Calderdale’s Chrissie Lund, now 17, stepped up to compete in the 17-26yrs senior class for the first time, duly winning it with a home-bred 39kg Beltex-x gimmer sold for £135.

Chrissie now works full-time on the family farm in Walshaw run by her parents Richard and Emma, and grandparents Brian and Linda Lund – they, too, are familiar faces at Skipton – and she is currently undertaking an agricultural apprenticeship course at Craven College’s auction mart campus.

The annual young farmers highlight again presented a perfect opportunity for farming’s future generations to gain valuable experience and knowledge in both the show and sale arenas, and learn about the importance of livestock markets, again with the support of ever-generous ringside bidders.

Show results and selling prices: Under 10s – 1 Raff Middleton £200, 2 Martha Middleton £200, 3 Ivy Simpson £172, 4 George-Ira Sugden £125; 10-16 years – 1 Charlie Leach £150, 2 Rosie Garth £130, 3 Oliver Marshall £145, 4 Jimmy Crabtree £142; 17-26 years – 1 Chrissie Lund £135.

Other competitors were Annie Gray, Henry Sugden, Bobby Crabtree, Henry Mellin, Thomas Marshall, Richard Pickles and Jack Metcalfe.

On Tuesday this week, CCM Skipton staged its opening annual prize show and sale of gimmer shearlings, the traditional pipe-opener to its annual breeding sheep season and one of the keynote early fixtures in the northern calendar. A full report will appear in next week’s Herald.