Red hot success in the beef ring for North Yorkshire couple

A NORTH Yorkshire couple stole home as victors in the beef rings at one of the most prestigious farming events of the season - making it six championship titles for their prolific Limousin cross heifer.
By Ben Barnett
Published 1st Dec 2015, 15:37 BST
Red Hot Honey, a Limousin cross shown by Mark Harryman and Sarah Warriner, who farm at Pickering in North Yorkshire, has been named supreme beef champion at the English Winter Fair at the Staffordshire County Showground.Red Hot Honey, a Limousin cross shown by Mark Harryman and Sarah Warriner, who farm at Pickering in North Yorkshire, has been named supreme beef champion at the English Winter Fair at the Staffordshire County Showground.
Red Hot Honey, a Limousin cross shown by Mark Harryman and Sarah Warriner, who farm at Pickering in North Yorkshire, has been named supreme beef champion at the English Winter Fair at the Staffordshire County Showground.

The English Winter Fair attracted 5,000 visitors to Staffordshire and it was Pickering farmers Mark Harryman and Sarah Warriner who impressed the most to take the supreme beef championship.

It was their April-born heifer Red Hot Honey, bought from Kevin Sparke of Hexham, that claimed the title.

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Mr Harryman said: “My father and I actually bred her sire, Keskadale Eyeful, which makes this win even more special. This is Honey’s sixth championship title; others include a class win at the Great Yorkshire and at Countryside Live.”

Judge, Wilson Peters from Crieff, Perthshire, said: “Red Hot Honey has a beautiful top line and great width. Her head is very feminine and she also has nice straight legs and good locomotion.”

In the beef cattle auction that followed, Red Hot Honey sold for £7,600 - £12.77 per kg - to Accrington-based butcher George Cropper.

The Fair hosted the National Pedigree Calf Show and it was Yorkshire exhibitors who dominated the proceedings, with the overall winner Liley Eye Spy, a home-bred Aberdeen Angus heifer calf put forward by Marsden Farms of South Yorkshire. In reserve position was a Hereford calf, entered by Heather Whittaker of Coley Walks Farm, Halifax, and bred by JRB Wilson of Kelso in the Scotland Borders.

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And in the event’s meat carcase classes there was another local winner.

A 54.4kg Pietrain cross, entered by Mark Horsley who farms at Skirpenbeck near York, was named the champion pig carcase, and sold for £122.40 - £2.25 per kg - to Manifold Valley Meats of Leek, Staffordshire.

Related topics:North Yorkshire