This years Connemara pony sales held in Clifden over the bank holiday weekend took place over 4 days with 840 ponies catalogues. Day 1 Friday October 28 comprised of mainly broken & ridden ponies with a small number of unbroken geldings also. A large overseas presence could be noticed from early in the sale. Top price on the day of €5,250 was paid by Kieran Egan for lot 138, a 7 year old gelding with 96 Showjumping points to his name. He was sold by Michael Rouse. The next highest price of €3,350 was paid by Gerty Tynan for lot 166, a 5 year old gelding broken & ridden by Celtic Bobby Sparrow. He was consigned by PJ Goggins. Demand was good for nice quality broken & ridden ponies. 14 ponies sold between €3,000 to €5,250 with a further 15 ponies fetching between €2,400 and €2,900. Unbroken geldings depending on quality, Colour and height sold from €1,500 to €2,500. Day 2 Saturday October 29 was made up of unbroken geldings and mares, yearling filly and colts, 2 year old fillies and colts and 3 year old fillies and colts. Top price on day 2 was €3,200 paid by Emma.Rugman from the Uk, this was for lot 282 a 4 year old unbroken mare by I Love you Melody, the vendor here was Michael Maloney from Galway. A large number of unbroken geldings of nice quality fetched from €2,000 to €2,700. 2 & 3 year old fillies seen a major increase in price from sales held in Clifden earlier in the year with 4 lots selling for over €2,000 and 14 fillies aged 2 & 3 years sold from €1,400 to €2,000. Yearling fillies fetched from between €800 to €1,500 again depending on quality. Day 3 Sunday October 30 saw the top price lot of the 4 days emerge in a outstanding 8 year old mare in foal purchased by Vannesa Compton from the UK for €6,000 , by Castle Comet out of the mare " Sweet Charity " she was in foal to the class 1 stallion " Cnocban Casanova " she was sold by Cian Geoghegan from Cong Co Mayo. Other in foal mares on the day fetched from between €1,200 to €1,800 with 2 mares selling for €2,400 & €2,650 respectively. The majority of the lots on both Sunday and Monday were foals. Top price foal over the 2 days was €1,650 paid for lot 590 a filly foal by Gwennic De Goariva out of the mare Mountain Primrose, seller here was Mary Nee and the buyer was Gabriel Farragher , lot 632 a dun filly foal by Moorland Snowy River and out of the mare Addrigoole Neana was sold by Kevin Nally for €1,600. The purchaser here was Conor Coyne. A large number of Colt foals sold from between €500 to €1,200 with a number of filly foals selling from between €400 to €1,000. From the 840 ponies catalogued for the sale, 702 passed through the ring, with 592 sold. The number of ponies sold overseas was the highest ever at a 4 day sale with the following figures here. Uk 29, France 22, Holland 30, Germany 41, Belguim 6, Sweden 4 and Switzerland 2. Its great to see the rise in prices especially for quality stock, but what's even better to see is at last the young stock of 2 and 3 year old fillies have finally came up in price. Extensive marketing and advertising in overseas countries has resulted in a large increase number of buyers attending the Clifden pony sales. The next sale of Connemara ponies takes place on Saturday February 18 2017. For more updates and information view website www.connemaraponysales.com