Sometimes Rejection is a Good Thing

Yesterday it was time to test Theresa with Zin again to see if we were making progress in getting her to cycle and possibly conceive a pregnancy.    Having watched Theresa over the last few days I was secretly optimistic that we were making progress, as she had been quite grumpy toward the weanlings who are her current pasture mates.  While she is pretty dominant and always first in line for food, once she starts eating she is usually focused on the task in hand, but on Thursday I had seen her fussing if any of the weanlings came near the hay feeder that she was feeding from and at one point chasing one of the weanlings away from the hay feeder (good job we have more than one in the pasture).

 

We put Theresa in a catch pen and as I brought Zin over to the pen I saw Theresa’s ears go flat back against her head – a good sign that she might reject him.  Before we could get Zin in the pen with Theresa she was spitting hard at him.  Having had her spit, scream and then cush the other day we decided we should let Zin into the pen with Theresa just to make sure that was not going to happen again.  It didn’t as Theresa ran from Zin and then turned to let him have it with some more spit.  A good indication that she has at least cycled.

 

So Zin was disappointed for the day and was returned to his pasture where he made it clear to his pasture mates that he was not a happy camper!  The downside of being a herdsire I’m afraid, but after a short while the hay feeder called to him and was a nice distraction.

 

So we now have all fingers and toes crossed that Theresa has conceived.  If nothing else we know she is now cycling again which is good news in itself.

 

We will behavior test Theresa in a week, I want to keep her stress levels low and I also want to give her reproductive tract a chance to recover from the two breedings she has recently had.  Should she cush when we test her we will give her an antiseptic flush in case she has a low grade uterine infection and then breed her the following day.  However we are going to remain optimistic that next time she encounters Zin she will again reject him giving us greater hope that she is now pregnant.  Keep your fingers crossed for us!

 

Rosemary

And Finally…….

   

Our last cria to be introduced is Windrush Zianna, born on June 4^th to our dam Ivanna and our herdsire Zin.  Zin has had a good season on our farm having sired Atlas, Rebecca’s cria, Pride, Anacia and Zianna. While Tobiano gave us his cria contribution in the form of Dream, Serenity and Stormy.

 

Zianna’s arrival coincided with the passing of our little cria Legs (see post June 6^th, Witnessing Life’s Circle) and she was a reminder of the brighter side of life.  A beautiful light fawn color with almost an apricot tinge to it, liquid brown eyes and the thickest of eyelashes Zianna is quite a character.  She loves to check out what you are doing and is quite a vocal cria, a trait that comes from her dam Ivanna.

 

Ivanna handled Zianna’s birth with ease; she is an experienced dam and a great milk producer.  She prefers to have people keep their distance a little while she is birthing, but interestingly she allowed one of her previous crias, Cariad (who is here for breeding) to be with her as she delivered Zianna.  I did eventually remove Cariad from the immediate area where Ivanna was as Cariad was being very curious about the half delivered cria and was starting to get in the way.  Ivanna delivered Zianna in her favorite place, right in front of the fan in the small shelter and I used some portable panels to prevent the other alpacas from intruding into the area as she finished delivering.  Cariad was still able to see her dam and was very curious about her new sister once she was delivered.

 

Zianna was the cria that Theresa decided to “steal” a few days after she was born during Theresa’s hormonal confusion!  Zianna seemed quite happy to be with Theresa and would try and nurse off Theresa when Theresa encouraged her too, but Theresa did not have milk and so eventually Zianna would return to Ivanna for nursing, much to Theresa’s dismay.  We eventually had to separate Theresa and Zianna, as we really did not want Zianna bonding to the wrong dam.

 

Zianna is already over 30 lbs, testimony to Ivanna’s good milk production record, and is one of the first to greet you when you go out in the pasture.

 

Of course Zianna was not the last to be born, Pride was born on June 9 and Desert Sandstorm (or Stormy as we call him) was born on June 13, but in all of the chaos at the time of Zianna’s birth I did not get a chance to introduce her.

 

We now have one cria left to be delivered this summer, our maiden dam Cinnamon is due in July and we are looking forward to seeing what she produces.  We see her cria kicking frequently and day by day Cinnamon gets a little larger but is not huge.  So are we going to get a little female cria or a little male cria, I guess we’ll just have to wait and see!

 

Rosemary

And It’s Back to the Cria Introductions with …….

Windrush Anacia, daughter of our Windrush Anya.  Anacia was born on June 2^nd, the sixth cria of our cria season.  When Anacia was born we were already bottling feeding Dream and taking care of little Legs as well as shearing.  Life was busy to say the least and the picture at the start of this post is the only one I have of Anacia when she was new born.  That’s a sure sign I was really busy when I only have one photo of a newborn cria!

 

Anacia was a big cria, weighing in at 21.7 lbs.  Her dam Anya is a big girl, but this was her first pregnancy and the delivery was a little tricky.  First Anacia’s head only presented, then after we had eased Anacia’s legs out Anya became tired and stopped while Anacia’s rib cage was half delivered.  As I watched Anacia start to turn blue I knew that the contractions were squeezing hard on her rib cage and it was time to help with some gentle pulling to ease Anacia’s body out of Anya.  Having delivered Anacia past her rib cage and seeing her color return, I waited for her hind legs to be delivered, which is usually very quick.  Anya though was tired and took another break from delivery; Anacia now being very alert tried to cush while she only had the front end of her body out in the open!  I have not seen a cria do that before (and I should have had my camera there for that picture), so Anacia sat quite patiently until Anya gave one final contraction.

 

Poor Anya looked quite drawn down after delivering Anacia and the placenta.  We gave Anya some extra feed and hay, a cool bucket of water and some MSE drench to perk her up.  I also started her on a course of arnica in applesauce three times a day to help reduce soreness and swelling following delivery.

 

Anacia unfortunately picked up the same infection as Legs the day after she was born and so the first few days of her life were spent with her receiving antibiotic shots to fight the infection and banamine shots to keep her temperature down.  Fortunately Anacia made a full recovery and is now a healthy, hearty 35 lbs plus cria.  She loves to prong in the evening and is so pretty as she glides around the pasture leading the other crias in their nightly dance.

 

Anacia was beige when she was born, almost a very light champagne color, but we believe as she ages she will most likely be all white.  I am curious to see how her personality emerges, as her dam Anya is very outgoing and is always the first in line for food.  At feeding time it almost seems as if we have several Anya’s as where ever we go with the feed there is Anya.

 

I will try and capture a better picture of Anacia in the next day or so as she is a pretty girl and you really can’t see her well in my one and only picture!

 

Rosemary

Another Success – of Sorts

In an earlier post (see post June 9, 2008) I had mentioned that Theresa, one of the alpacas who is boarded with us, had a retained CL that we were treating.  Theresa had fooled us into believing she was pregnant and after over a year’s wait we realized that she had a retained CL that made her think she was pregnant.

 

We started treating Theresa with Estrumate to help her release the CL and cycle again.  The first treatment had an effect on Theresa but not the one we were looking for.  The Estrumate seemed to make Theresa feel that she had delivered a cria and she stole Ivanna’s cria Zianna.  Zianna (who is still to be introduced on this blog) was quite happy to spend her day with Theresa, but Theresa didn’t have any milk and Ivanna wanted her cria back and so we put Theresa in with a group of young alpacas we were weaning. 

 

Not having had any success with the Estrumate treatment we repeated it a week later, Theresa continued to reject the male indicating to us that the retained CL was still retained.  We consulted with our vet who suggested that we wait another week and try the treatment again.  If that was not effective we would then need to consult a reproductive specialist.

 

We gave Theresa the third Estrumate treatment and finally this past Saturday she cushed for our male alpaca Zin and allowed herself to be bred.  Zin who usually breeds for 20 minutes bred Theresa for 40 minutes.  We mentioned this to our vet when we were at his clinic for the ultrasound appointment and our vet said that all of the Estrumate Theresa had received might have had an effect on how she smelt to Zin encouraging his marathon breeding session.  Thinking back I had noticed that Zin had been glued to the fence line for most of the week, gazing longingly over at the girls pasture – perhaps all of that Estrumate really had put love in the air!

 

On Tuesday while we were breeding some other alpacas I noticed Theresa walk over and cush in front of Zin’s pen indicating that she still has not cycled or conceived.  Having noticed Theresa’s behavior we decided to breed her again yesterday which would be three days since the last breeding.  I fully expected Theresa to cush immediately Zin entered the pen, but instead she spit at him, screamed in his face and then cushed.  This is not normal for Theresa, she is usually pretty definite in her reactions and to me her reaction to Zin was a bit of a mixed message.  Zin bred her for 20 minutes this time, during which Theresa remained cushed and seemed very comfortable.  Still though a question hovers in my mind as to whether she really has not cycled or whether the Estrumate now has her confused as to her reproductive state.

 

We are going to wait several days before testing Theresa again to allow her body a chance to decide what it really feels.  Should she cush again for Zin then we will take some different steps to ensure that she does not have a uterine infection before we subject her to another breeding.  An alpaca breeding is quite hard on the female’s reproductive tract and we would rather take things a little slower and make sure Theresa is healthy than over breed her and possibly cause more damage than good.

 

And while we figure out what to do with Theresa young Zin will have to spend his days gazing across at the girls pasture acknowledging the fact that as far as a breeding male alpaca is concerned love is in the air and just a pasture away!

 

Rosemary

Three for three is a good thing!

Yesterday was ultrasound day.  The three female alpacas from Texas – Cariad, Marti and Celeste were at a point in their pregnancy when we could confirm their pregnancy by ultrasound and so we headed off to the vets with the three girls in the trailer.

 

Out vet usually likes to ultrasound at the 45 day post breeding point.  Some vets can confirm pregnancy by ultrasound as early as 21 days post breeding, but our vets’ ultrasound equipment is older and so less clear than some of the newer models.

 

The girls were actually all closer to 50 to 60 days bred, we had sheared them just a week or so ago and we wanted to wait a while after shearing to make sure the pregnancies had held.  Before shearing we had given the girls Banamine to help with soreness and to help block any early contractions and we had also sedated them with some Acepromazine.  All three girls handled shearing well, and a few days after shearing we behavior tested them with one of our male alpacas and all three rejected the male.

 

I always love to watch the ultrasound screed and see the image of the embryo as the vet finds it and today we were treated to the sight of three embryos, one in each of the girls. 

We have called the girls owners and given them the good news and they are naturally anxious to get their alpacas home.

 

So a good day all in all, and it even finished off with a little rain in the evening, what more could we ask for?

 

Rosemary

Taking a Gamble on a First Time Event

Unfortunately the Cowboy Symposium was not as well attended as we had hoped.  While it was a good event with plenty to see and do, for some reason not many people showed up.  Perhaps it was the fact that it was a little drive out of town and gas prices are so high, or perhaps it was that there were several other events over the weekend that people could attend.

 

It is always a gamble taking part in a first time event; you never know how successful it will be.  I am sure the organizers must have been disappointed, but those people who did attend the event thoroughly enjoyed it.

 

The storms promised for Friday night did not materialize, which was a good thing as it meant that Friday night’s Red Steagal concert could go ahead as planned.  Saturday morning though brought a storm first thing in the morning with high winds and rain.  Some of the vendor’s booths suffered from the storm but as one of the attendees said, “Anyone who complains about rain is not from this country” a very true statement.  We are so desperate for rain that people seemed happier that day despite the mess the early morning storm made and the rest of the day was beautifully calm.

 

There were many sites to see at the symposium including the longhorn steers in the picture at the top of this blog.  Those steers were ridden all day and appeared very relaxed and calm.  They really were quite the sight and even came into the vendor tent to pay us a visit.  When you get up close to those steers they are truly magnificent.

 

While our sales did not even come close to our booth fee, the symposium was once again a chance to establish our presence in the local area and market our products to new people.  Who knows what might happen as a result of our presence there as many people took business cards and flyers.  We knew were taking a gamble on the event when we signed up but felt it was worth the risk.  I suspect by next year’s symposium word will have spread and the attendance will be much higher.

 

Our good friend Barb Mackenzie, who came out to the symposium with her husband Don, took the photos in this blog.   Thank you Barb for sharing the photos you took, including this next one, that we think should be called “The End”!

 

Rosemary

Alpaca Products at the Cowboy Symposium

Today through Sunday I will be busy manning a booth at the Running Water Draw Cowboy Symposium that is being held at Ned Houck Park in Clovis.

 

This is the first year of the Cowboy Symposium and it sounds as if it will be a fun event with chuck wagon cook offs, trail rides, horseshoe pitching, a kid’s rodeo, cowboy poetry and concerts.  A cowboy church is also planned for Sunday morning.

 

The performers at the event are a mix of those from the local area (Allie Brooks, Sharon Dictson, Jimmie Joe Jester, Dr. Les Morrow and David Downey) and also those from further afield (Red Steagall, Jean Prescott, Yvonne Hollenbeck and Sweethearts in Carhartts).

 

The days promise to be long ones, but it will be another opportunity to showcase our alpaca products in front of the public and hopefully will result in some product sales too.  I am thinking that the rugs, socks and gloves will be a hit among those attending but will take some yarn, scarves and other products too.  You never quite know at an event what items will be your best seller and I can guarantee if I decide to leave something behind that is the thing someone will ask me for!

 

I am sure The Running Water Draw Cowboy Symposium will bring back memories of a trip Ric and I took several years ago with my parents who were visiting from England at that time.  We went to the Lincoln County Cowboy Symposium in Glencoe, New Mexico (close to Ruidoso, New Mexico) and had a lovely time learning more about the western and cowboy lifestyle.  A big thank you goes out to Annette Taylor, one of the organizers of the event who has been a delight to work with and whom I am sure has spent many hours making sure that the Running Water Draw Cowboy Symposium is a successful event.

 

The blog entries might be sparse during the next few days, depending on how I feel at the end of each day, but hopefully I will have enough energy to at least write a few words during the weekend.

 

 

Rosemary

And Next Came …..

Windrush Silken Serenity and what a pretty girl she is.

 

Serenity was born to our white girl Alpenglow’s Sandia Snow and is out of our dark brown herdsire Tobiano.  Snow has a small patch of fawn fiber on her left hind foot, her sire was dark fawn and her dam was light fawn with a lot of color in her lineage and so we hoped by breeding Snow to Tobiano we would get color and we did.  Serenity is the most beautiful rich chocolate brown (the picture here does not do her color justice and her ears have now straightened up having been a little squashed during birth).

 

Snow delivered Serenity at 3:30 pm on May 30^th.  Snow has always been a quiet alpaca and the only clue she gave me that she was close to giving birth was at lunchtime when I noticed her udder was filled with milk.  I check the udders of all of my late term pregnancy girls every morning and I knew that in the morning Snow’s udder had been quite small and that the change in it’s appearance was probably significant.

 

As I gave Dream her afternoon bottle I looked across the pasture and there in the shade of the elm tree was Snow quite obviously in labor.  I could see that she had a little more pushing to do before the cria’s head and feet emerged and so let Dream finish her bottle and then went in to get my cria kit, blanket and towels. 

 

By the time I came out Snow had made some progress and I could see a little dark nose emerging.  Snow delivered Serenity without any assistance and did not make a sound during delivery, not a hum, not a grunt, not a groan.  The delivery was one of the most serene I have every seen hence Serenity’s name. 

 

Initially after delivering Serenity, Snow was a little perplexed about what had just happened, she didn’t seem to put two and two together and realize that Serenity was her cria.  Serenity is Snow’s first cria and sometimes maiden alpacas take a little while to realize their new responsibility.  I brought Snow over to Serenity and encouraged her to sniff her top start the bonding process.  Once Snow had delivered the placenta I put the two in a catch pen for a few hours to allow them to bond.

 

Snow has proved to be an excellent dam who is attentive to her cria and who produces lots of milk.  Serenity is a little live wire, tearing up the pasture with the other crias and showing that lovely curiosity about her surroundings that crias have.

 

Serenity’s fleece is very interesting.  It has an incredibly silky feel to it, is very fine and very bright.  I can see some crimp forming close to the skin and I am curious as to how her fleece will develop as she grows up.  Tobiano has thrown cria before with silky style fleece and I suspect that is what we are seeing in Serenity.  Time will tell, but we feel Serenity has some very special qualities to her fleece and we are already excited at the prospect of being able to show her.

 

Rosemary

Another New Addition to Introduce

Except this little girl does not have a name yet.  She was born on May 29 to Rebecca, who is owned by Kathryn and Tracy Annis of Dripping Springs, Texas. 

 

Rebecca’s little girl was somewhat of a surprise.  We knew Rebecca was close to her due date, but our late night check the night before found a happy and content Rebecca chewing her cud and sitting comfortably.

 

On the morning of May 29 I followed my usual routine of looking out at the girls pasture as soon as I got up.  It was about 6 a.m. and as I looked across the pasture I could see a black alpaca and a medium to dark fawn cria sitting out by the big blue shelter.  Our Queen had delivered her cria on May 13 and as I looked across the pasture I thought that was who I was looking at, until Queen’s cria Atlas ran past the other cria that was sitting in the pasture.  Hold on a minute I thought, that’s one too many crias! 

 

I called to Ric that we had an extra cria in the pasture, pulled on some clothes (although the neighbors are getting to used to seeing me in my pajamas in the pastures these days!) and ran out to see who had delivered a cria.  As I got nearer I could see that it was Rebecca who had given birth and her cria was sitting happily beside her – a beautiful medium fawn girl out of our herdsire Windrush Jennifer’s Zindel.

 

The cria still had the membrane from the amniotic sack attached to her, but it was dry and flaked off easily.  A check of the pasture revealed that the afterbirth was in the big blue shelter, indicating that was most likely where the cria had been born.  Rebecca’ is no fool and choose a comfortable, sheltered place to have her cria.

 

We got busy drying off the cria, dipping her naval in Iodine, checking to see that Rebecca had milk and removing the wax caps off her teats and watching to make sure the cria was nursing and getting milk.

 

It seemed as if we were not the only ones who had missed the big event, as once the other alpacas saw us in the pasture they realized something was going on and all rushed over to greet the new arrival.

Rebecca’s cria has proved to be an independent, strong girl.  Rebecca keeps her on a fairly close rein, calling her back to her side if she strays too far, although she does allow her to join in with the crias nightly gallop and chase around the pasture.  Rebecca as always is an excellent dam and has provided great milk for her cria.  Already Rebecca’s cria is over 30 lbs. and is bearing a striking resemblance to her half brother Atlas (they share the same sire), although Atlas is a shade darker than Rebecca’s cria.

 It is difficult to name a cria when you are hundreds of miles away as Kathryn and Tracy are.  I tried to email them some pictures of their new girl but they were unable to open them.  Hopefully they can access this blog entry and at least get an idea of what she looks like and be inspired to give her a name.  In the meantime we will call her RG for Rebecca’s girl and enjoy watching her grow and thrive. (By the way Rebecca and her new cria are up for sale so if you are looking for an excellent black dam who throws some gorgeous crias and who has a beautiful female cria by her side send us an email and we will give you more information.)

 

Rosemary

And The Honorable Mention Goes To……. Me!

Just before I left for my trip to England I made a last minute decision to enter some of my photographs in the Photo Competition at the Alpaca Owners and Breeders Association (AOBA) National Show, which was held this year in Sandy, Utah.  The National show is one of the largest alpaca shows in the US and while I was not going to be able to enter alpacas in the show I thought I could at least enter the photo competition.

 

I sent in three photos, one was of Blast nursing when he was a cria, the other was of young Megan Stewart (daughter of our friend Jennifer Stewart) in with some of the male alpacas, and the third was of Jennifer Stewart and Zeus at Halloween when Jennifer visited our farm dressed as a clown.

 

I hadn’t heard anything back on my photo entries until the other day when a large padded envelope arrived in the mail.  Inside was a ribbon and a letter from AOBA informing me that I had received an honorable mention in the Humor Category for my photo of Jennifer and Zeus.  I was very pleased, this is the first time I had ever won any sort of award for photography and as my photos usually leave a lot to be desired it is quite an achievement for me!

 

For the competition I titled the photo “I’m cute what’s your excuse” and you can see it on my blog entry for November 1, 2007.   Part way through that blog entry you will see two pictures together, the one I submitted to the competition is the one on the right hand side.

 

The ribbon will now go on display in our studio I think, along with a copy of the picture.  It will also be printed in the Autumn 2008 copy of Alpacas Magazine and will eventually be loaded on the AOBA members website www.alpacaowners.com – not bad for a last minute entry!

 

Rosemary