Modesto Livestock Auction and Flea Market

From seven o’clock on Monday mornings, animals arrive at the yards at 1107 South Seventh Street in Modesto. The yards keep taking them until the sales begin. Goats, sheep and hogs go through the ring at 10 a.m., and ducks, chickens and rabbits follow in the poultry auction at 11. The sale runs every Monday, rain or shine, holidays included. The auction describes its crowds as “over capacity” with “lots of action,” and says it takes special care over the humane handling of the animals. Horses are not sold here. A buyer pays in full before an animal leaves the premises, and once it leaves the ring the sale is final.

Three market days on South Seventh

Monday is also the last of the flea market’s three days. The market opens every Saturday, Sunday and Monday through the year, holidays included, and the home page announced it would be open on Labor Day. Parking and entry are free. The operators count over 300 vendors and say thousands of shoppers come each week. Aisles of fresh produce run between the stalls, along with food stands and tables of household goods. Most vendors take open spaces of about 17 by 21 feet, rented by the morning, and some keep permanent containers on the grounds. On Sundays from noon to 3 p.m. there is free live music and dancing, and there are pony rides. An Instagram profile for the market, with posts running through July 2015, gave the market days as Sunday and Monday only.

Also on the property are 7th Street Feed and Aquatic, open five days a week, and a collection of animals “from all over the world” kept for viewing. Among them is Daisy, a Watusi, whose owners say she has the longest horns in the world. Dogs are not allowed anywhere on the property.

Holsteins for the dairymen

Under the name Modesto Livestock Commission Co., Inc., the business also runs a buying station for dairy cattle four days a week. A letter on its website, addressed “Mr. Dairyman” and signed “Lary,” marks the station’s 15th year. The letter gives no year, but it reports more than 9,000 head of Holstein butcher cows, bulls and heifers marketed “so far this year.” It says the cows go to the highest bid, with all the slaughterhouses invited to bid, and that sellers are paid the same day. Lary adds: “I encourage you to always feel free to discuss the price, if you wish.”

The station posts its prices every week. For the week of September 28, 2026, top fat cows were listed at 135 to 150 cents, thin risky cows at 50 to 100 cents, big muscular bulls at 160 to 185 cents, and barren heifers and steers of 800 pounds and up at 170 to 200 cents. The sheet ends with a line in capitals: “Everytime We Make A Friend, We Grow A Little More.”

Circuses on the blacktop

Away from the market days, the public can rent the grounds: about three acres to set up on, with five more acres of parking, most of it blacktop. The operators say that for many years circus performers from all over the world have come here to perform their acts. Carnivals, car shows, revivals and wrestling matches have used the place too.

The family that runs the business dates it to 1939 and says it has owned and operated it ever since. The auction page was written when the business had passed 70 years. It calls the sale one of the oldest in the state and describes its trade as marketing sheep, goats, hogs, chickens and rabbits across northern California.

An archive holds a scan of the Modesto Bee and News Herald classified page for January 13, 1940, but the text is badly garbled. The page does not show whether the firm named there is the same business. Among advertisements for alfalfa hay, Holstein heifers and Barred Plymouth Rocks “alive or ready to cook,” one notice from “Modesto auction co.” announces a livestock auction for Wednesday, January 17, at 10 a.m.: dairy cows, bulls, calves and sows.