Welcome to the PortShan Beef Shorthorn Sale online sale 2022. This sale will open for bidding on Friday, 2nd September with the first lot closing at 8pm on Sunday, 4th September 2022.  All lots will close in sequential order and may have their time extended due to last-minute bidding (see bidding tutorial below for more details)

Portshan Herd was established in 1980 

-Frank runs 25 Cow Pedigree Beef Shorthorn Herd and farm 100 acres in Leitrim Village on the banks of the River Shannon in Co Leitrim. Franks Father Bernie, began breeding shorthorns in the early 1980's. Our first pure bred shorthorn stock bull was bred by Jim Bohan and the bull was Drumrane Joxer. Frank says at the time, the herd was a Friesian Milking Herd and my father Bernie left the milking and moved to suckler farming. We started out with a lot of Angus and Blue Angus cattle as well as Blood Reds. Frank says it has taken a long time to come to a field of roan and red shorthorn cattle but we are now there today.  Frank believes time and patience pays in the end. Frank likes the  traditional type shorthorn cattle and believes shorthorn is the only breed for him. 

Over the last 40 years Portshan has used the following Stock Bulls:  

• Drumrane Joxer bred by Jim Bohan - out of Tourant Sir James and a Castletroy Smasher Cow  
• Glann Lightening bred by the Flatleys - out of Oldmill Dominic and a Ballygarrane Belgold Cow  
• Cornee Major bred by Sean Kilraine – out of Kilkelly Major and a Newbliss Broadhooks Boy 3rd Cow  
• Cavan Melbourne bred in Scotland  
• ‘Rockville Clohessy Dice’ bred by Anthony Dockery – out of Creaga Dice and a Bushypark Enda 4th Cow.   
• Bethlehem Starboy bred by Tom Fox - out of Bethlehem Breeze a son of Perfect Storm and a Bushypark Snowdrop Cow 
• Ovaun Mars bred by Michael Gunn - out of Chapelton Widlfire and a RAHEENADEERAGH ROSIE cow 

Portshan has bred champion heifers, the most prolific being Portshan Blueway who won several national titles and in 2020 won the overall breed championship. Portshan Freeze won the overall Shorthorn championship in Elphin in 2018. Port Shan Gail was sold at the National Shorthorn sale in 2021 for a cool €3200.  
“” Most of Portshan cow families are bred from our stock bulls over the years and today we currently use little AI. In Port Shan Herd quality stock is important and 'what you see is what you get' is my motto. I don’t have too much belief in the shampooing and dolling up as a good beast will show itself any day. Here we like to breed beef shorthorns that are structurally correct, displaying depth and width with good bone, head, and length and economical to maintain. We like the beef shorthorn for their calving ease, motherly nature, quiet temperament, fertility levels and their size which suits northwest of Ireland farming. We are fortunate as the majority of our land is limestone, it has the ability to flesh cattle with little or no meal feeding required. We have a good market for heifers which we sell at sales or off the land to both pedigree and commercial breeders. The bull trade is somewhat more difficult, but it has improved, and we sell the majority of our bulls off the field. We believe we can compete with all other breeds in the marketplace as the beef shorthorn may have a significant role to play in the future of farmers breeding plans. There is no doubt that we can serve the suckler and dairy farmers well for stock bulls but as a whole more needs to be done to educate farmers of the benefits that the breed has to offer.””