Family News

Family News
Donegal ram sells for record €44,000

A farmer from Co Donegal has sold a ram for €44,000, which is the highest amount ever paid for a male sheep at a sale in Ireland, RTÉ reports.

The record-breaking, seven-month-old Suffolk ram attracted notice when it went on sale in Wicklow. It was sold by Ballybofey, Co. Donegal farmer Richard Thompson.

He told RTÉ that it was a “dream come true”.

The largest amount paid for a ram previously at a sale at Blessington Mart in Co. Wicklow was €38,000.

A consortium, led by Dennis Taylor, a farmer from Coleraine in Northern Ireland, paid the record-breaking price.

Robin McIlrath, chief executive of the Suffolk Sheep Society, said it was an “excellent sale”.

“Richard’s record-breaking lamb was the cherry on the cake,” he said.

Mr Thompson said the money will all go straight back into the farm.

 

UK milkman arrested after being mistaken for burglar

A milkman in England was arrested on suspicion of being a burglar despite showing police pints of milk and empties in the back of his van, his employer said.

The delivery man was held by officers in Newton Aycliffe, County Durham, in the early hours of yesterday even after they witnessed him leaving milk on a customer’s doorstep, according to his boss.

Officers were investigating an incident at the Greenfield Convenience Store and were looking for a man in a van.

The milkman rang his boss, Russ Gibson, at around 2.45am to say there was police activity in the area.

Mr Gibson said the driver then rang again to say he had been followed by police, stopped and asked what he was doing at that early hour, despite them seeing him make a delivery to a doorstep.

The officers seemed unconvinced, Mr Gibson said, so the driver showed them the milk and empties in the back of the unmarked white van, and he was allowed to continue on his way.

Around 15 minutes later, the driver had stopped for a coffee break and was met by officers from three patrol cars who said they were arresting him on suspicion of burglary.

 

WHO seeks moratorium on Covid booster doses

The World Health Organisation is calling for a moratorium on Covid-19 vaccine boosters until at least the end of September.

The move is to enable that at least 10% of the population of every country was vaccinated, WHO head Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said.

“I understand the concern of all governments to protect their people from the Delta variant. But we cannot accept countries that have already used most of the global supply of vaccines using even more of it,” Mr Tedros added.