TENNESSEE LIVESTOCK PRODUCERS TO HOLD GRAND OPENINGS FOR TWO NEW AUCTION BARNS

(National Livestock Producers Association / Tennessee Livestock Producers, 3/19) –Tennessee Livestock Producers (TLP) has a busy weekend ahead with grand openings planned in Columbia, Tenn., on Friday, March 21st and at Fayetteville, Tenn., on Saturday, March 22, 2008.

The Tennessee Livestock Producers sale barn in Columbia will open with a Herd Improvement Heifer Sale at noon and will feature many elite bred heifers that have been genetically tracked.

“We usually sell these heifers in the fall, but due to the drought conditions, these heifers have been fed through the winter and will have babies by their sides, with 90 percent AI-sired,” according to Darrell Ailshie, TLP General Manager, “We are extremely pleased to offer such an impressive set of females for our first sale.”

The barn has been designed to consider the movement of animals and is less stressful for both the animals and is safer for employees, Ailshie said. The barn also has more hay and water pens and added space for livestock. The barn will easily accommodate TLP’s special cow sales, and their sheep and goat sales, which eventually move to this facility.

“Last year we sold more than 20,000 head of sheep and goats at our sales and this year we hope for even more, “Ailshie said. “Several purebred groups have also expressed their interest in using the facility for their events.”

This facility is being considered by the community as a meeting place and a place to host a variety of sales.

“We want this facility to be more than a market place, but a service center for the community,“ he said.

The Special Cow Sale at 1 p.m. on Saturday will be the first for the newly re-built TLP facility in Fayetteville, Tenn. The original barn burned down after an electrical fire on Jan. 2, 2008.

“We are excited to have this barn back up again so quickly. There is a lot of demand for a market in the area,” Ailshie said. “We received so much encouragement and support from the local producers and we couldn’t have gotten through without the Lincoln County Farm Bureau, which let us use their facilities as a temporary office.”

The sale will feature several high-quality replacement cows and cow/calf pairs.

“Now that we’ve had some moisture, we are seeing some demand for cows,” Ailshie said. “We worked to assemble some nice cows to offer back at this special sale.”

The Fayetteville barn will resume its weekly Tuesday sale schedule on April 1, 2008.