ABOUT seven serious buyers were actively bidding at Bendigo's first cattle sale on Monday morning, a rise from about two or three, which has been the norm.
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It was the first of a three month trial of Monday sale days, a bid to attract lucrative buyers already in Bendigo for the popular weekly lamb sales.
Bendigo's cattle sales have traditionally held on a Tuesday.
Cattle numbers at the sale have declined significantly in recent years.
By moving the cattle sale to a Tuesday, the exchange hopes to capture the mixed species buyers.
Mr McCulloch said results were positive so far.
"[Buyers] have been here religiously on Monday for a sheep sale, they've got up a half an hour earlier to buy some cattle. It was a bit of a no-brainer," Mr McCulloch said.
"We were always confident that they were going to do that and it's followed through exactly as we thought.
"The reality is the way things were going on the Tuesday really wasn't working, it's that simple. So whilst we're heading into a trial period here, it was quite evident that the Tuesdays weren't playing out the way that we'd like."
McKean McGregor livestock agent Glenn Rea said people were reporting prices were 20-30 cents better a kilo at the same for most grades of cattle.
Standing on the rails, it was "outstanding" to look so many buyers in the face, Mr Rea said.
Where he'd been working with a two key buyers and some local butchers in the Tuesday sales, there were six staff buyers and about 12 buyers all up, he said.
More buyers allowed him to get the best price for the farmers, Mr Rea said.
"With any auction system in any sale yard, you need more numbers to get more buyers, or more buyers to get more numbers. So it's sort of the chicken before the egg," he said.
"So when we have such a large scale sheep and lamb sale with multi-species buyers, it just really made sense."
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