FROM all over Southern England and as far away as Lincolnshire the countryside came to town on Saturday with breeders and buyers crowding Ashford Market for the annual spring sale of domestic birds. After Hobbs Parker were forced to abandon their three major sales last year when the market was closed during the foot and mouth crisis, they were again able to present what proved to be their biggest and most wide-ranging yet catalogue of entries.

Auctioneer Mark Cleverdon, assisted in selling by Sam Snart, between them offered more than 1,000 birds, plus other stock and equipment in three and a half hours of frantic bidding. For the most part they were competing against a cacophony of noise caused by the quacking, crowing and clucking of the prize caged birds on offer.

Trade was brisk throughout a morning of frantic activity with several lots topping the £100 mark. But there were bargains for the crowds of buyers, ranging from smallholders, collectors and show bird fanciers, to the householders who just like to keep a few fowl in their back garden to produce the freshest eggs for breakfast, if they were able to catch the auctioneers eye.

At the end at delighted Mr Cleverdon said the range of quality birds and other stock on offer to more than 300 buyers had amazed him. He said: "There was a huge demand and my professional view is that hobby farmers and smallholders and switching from keeping four legged animals, with all the paper work involved in keeping a few sheep of cattle, to having poultry and ducks."