Avington Merinos tops at $2600

The 107-kilogram son of Alfoxton-070412 made $2600 - a notch higher than last year's top of $2400.

The 17-micron horned ram was eventually won by Alan and Jan Kuebil, Boho, who purchased five rams in total.

The ram boasted a 100 per cent wool comfort factor, 2.8 standard deviation and 16.5 coefficient of variation.

Buyers gathered from a wide radius, including west of Ballarat and Geelong and from the North East of Victoria.

This year was the second time Avington held their sale on property, and stud principal Noel Henderson was pleased to maintain their total clearance record.

"The sale was a bit quiet this year, but I think that's reflecting the season around here - a lot of people have got a fairly concerned outlook," he said.

Overall the average of $1012 was down $41 on last year across the same number of rams sold.

"We still have confidence there is a market for our superfine and ultrafine wool and are focusing on the quality to make sure when it leaves the shed it's a great product," Mr Henderson said.

Despite a somewhat dry year, the scale of the rams had increased on last year, he said.

A mix of new and return clients made up the buying schedule.

John Cooper, Yundool, faced strong competition on some of the rams he had earmarked, paying $1600, $1100 and $900 for his rams.

After getting out of sheep at his family property in North-East Victoria, the family had gone back into sheep recently, and decided to swim upstream against current wool market trends.

"A lot of the sheep now have gone to coarse, crimpy wool, but we don't really like that; we would rather stick with the fine wool that we like to produce," he said.

Buying in bulk was Rosedale Pty Ltd, who bought five lots to $800, av $740.