One Paca Too Many

 

Sometimes things within the alpaca herd are a fine balance and the smallest of changes can upset that balance and cause problems.

 

Our herd pointed this out to us recently. 

 

When Marti, Orchid and Candytuft completed their quarantine period we allowed them to join the main female herd.  As usual there was much sniffing and checking out of the new additions to the herd.  We then had to figure out where Marti and Orchid were going to eat at feeding time, Candytuft at that time was not eating pellets and so we thought she would most likely go wherever Orchid went.  (Note:  Candytuft has since discovered the pellets and is now not at all shy about pushing her way into a feed bowl!).  Marti has stayed with us before and we felt confident that she would figure out a good place for her to eat.

 

Our custom at feeding time is to have the girls eat in pens in groups of similar need.  We group fast eaters together, slower eaters together, heavily pregnant girls together etc.

 

Orchid went in to eat with Chai, which worked out well as Orchid does not hold back when it comes to getting her share of the pellets and neither does Chai.  Marty started off eating with Orchid and Chai, but after a couple of days decided that she didn’t like that arrangement and instead went in with the eight dams of the fall crias.

 

We didn’t think too much about Marti’s move to a different pen.  The pen the eight girls feed in is a large one, certainly large enough to accommodate nine alpacas at feeding time – or so we thought.

 

A couple of days after Marti had moved to the bigger pen I noticed that Clarissa, who also eats in that pen, had a slight choke.  I made sure that Clarissa was okay and didn’t think too much more about it.  The next day though Clarissa started to choke again at feeding time, this time a bit harder. 

 

Choke in alpacas can be a serious problem; left unattended the choke can cause additional problems and can even result in the death of the alpaca.  Interestingly there is an article about an alpaca that died as a result of a choke situation in the latest edition of Alpacas Magazine.   The article is worth reading and explains the possible consequences of an unattended choke.

 

We were concerned that as Clarissa had choked two days in a row that she might have scratched or irritated her esophagus and so decided that we should feed her soaked feed for a couple of days.  To do this effectively we needed to put Clarissa in a pen on her own to eat, and so utilized a catch pen that we had available.  Clarissa enjoyed her soaked feed and did not choke again, but she also took really quickly to eating on her own in the catch pen.  By the second time of feeding her in that catch pen she ran over to it and was standing waiting for us as we arrived with her food bowl. 

 

Clarissa had not choked at all before Marti joined the feeding group, but apparently the addition of Marti to the group just tipped the dynamics and balance of that group enough to cause a problem.  As far as Clarissa was concerned Marti was just one paca too many.

 

Within a couple of days Clarissa was back to eating unsoaked feed without any problems with choking.  Marti and the other seven girls in her feeding group were getting along well and Clarissa was still running to the catch pen at every feeding time and so we decided to let that arrangement continue, with Clarissa now having what we refer to as “her own private dining area”.  Balance has been restored to the herd and everyone is once again happy.

 

Rosemary

It’s a Start

Geraint - nicely shorn for the summer

 

Saturday found us making a start on shearing.  We didn’t plan on doing the majority of the herd, we just wanted to do a few to help Ric get back into shearing mode and make sure that our set up was good for when we do a larger shearing day.

 

Things went well, the pace was not a fast one and neither had we intended it to be.  One of the advantages of shearing your own alpacas is that you can set your own pace.  In past years when we have contracted a shearer to shear the herd, the pace of shearing was dictated by the need to get all the alpacas shorn before the shearer stopped at the end of the day.  Granted professional shearers are much faster at shearing than Ric is (they’ve had a lot more practice over the years), but we still had to keep things moving at a pretty good pace to get all the shearing done by the end of the day.  On Saturday we took our time and at the end of the day we still had calm alpacas and calm humans.

 

The pace of our next shearing will be a little faster, but we would rather take our time and do a good job than rush things and make a mess.  Believe me you can really make a mess with a novice shearer and a pair of electric shears.

 

Rascal, Echo, Zeus, Geraint and Orchid now sport their new sleek summer look.   We could feel how warm they were when we sheared them and I am sure that they are enjoying being cooler.

 

Surprisingly our fleeces were not as sand laden as we thought they might be.  The wind has been blowing frequently and hard for several months now and we were sure that out fine red dirt would have found its way into the fleeces but that was not the case.  There was some dirt, but nothing like a couple of years ago when little piles of sand accumulated on the shearing mats from each alpaca we sheared.  We did vacuum out our alpacas before shearing this year, so maybe that helped some.  Whatever the reason the lack of dirt helped our blades on our shears to keep going longer and made for cleaner fleeces to be sent to processing.

 

The majority of our fleeces I will have sorted by Troy Ogilvie of Timber Lodge Alpacas, who is a client of ours and also an apprentice fiber sorter.  The fleeces from Saturday’s shearing will have to be sorted from the bag when Troy arrives for our next shearing day, but those fleeces that are shorn on our next shearing day will be sorted and graded as they come off the alpacas and then the various grades will be ready to go to the Regional Collection Facility for the North American Alpaca Fiber (NAAFP) Co-op.  Sheared, sorted and shipped – that’s the way to deal with your fleeces!

 

While the majority of our fleeces will go to the NAAFP Co-op, we will also be sending some fleece to the Alpaca Fiber Coop of North America (AFCNA), the Alpaca Blanket Project, the New England Alpaca Fiber Pool (NEAFP) and then of course there will be some fleeces kept for showing and for my own fiber projects.

 

We still have close to fifty alpacas left to shear, but at least we have made a start and have put ourselves in a shearing frame of mind.

 

Rosemary

Guilty!

Guilty Bjorn - her legs give her away!

 

Just look at those front legs, caked in mud from the knee down.  Looking at those legs I know that Bjorn has been sticking her feet in the water buckets!

 

Bjorn is not alone in her activity, Merry Me and Melody like to join in too and TeQueely just loves to splash in the water if enough is spilled.  It was only on Tuesday that Melody came around the side of the barn with a guilty look on her face.  Melody had not had her feet in the water buckets then but a short while later I caught her with her feet in the automatic waterer!

 

From the alpacas antics you can probably tell that our temperatures have warmed up.  The last few days have been in the mid eighties and for once the wind has not been blowing – perfect!

 

We have set the fans running in each shelter and they will now run for the rest of the summer.  Soon we will also put electrolytes in some of the water buckets to help keep the alpacas well hydrated.

 

Of course the biggest thing we can do to help keep the alpacas cool is to shear them, and it’s that time!  Today we will be shearing a few of the herd.  Our main shearing day will be in a couple of weeks time, but Ric asked for one day prior to that date for him to shear a few alpacas without spectators to allow him the chance to get back into the rhythm of shearing.  We will probably do no more than six alpacas but it will be enough for the first day of shearing.

 

I suspect though that even with fans, electrolytes and shearing we still will find that certain alpacas will be putting their feet in the water buckets and once more their mud caked legs will be labeling them as guilty!

 

Rosemary

On a Happier Note

 

Following a sad start to the week, it was good to see something happier happen in the herd.  For the first time in her pregnancy I saw Shiimsa’s cria kicking.

 

Shiimsa is a maiden alpaca and while I was sure from her shape and her recent ravenous appetite she was still pregnant I had not yet seen her cria move.  I find that sometimes in maiden alpacas you do not seem to see the cria move as much as in those alpacas who have had a cria or two.  I suspect that the toned muscles of the maidens hold up stronger than the muscles of the older girls and thus hide the movement of the cria until those movements become really strong.

 

As Shiimsa’s pregnancy has progressed she has been gaining a nice round shape and definitely looks like a pregnant alpaca but there is nothing quite like seeing that cria move to make you feel confident that all is progressing as it should be.

 

Shiimsa is not due until the beginning of June and it will be interesting to see what color her cria is.  Shiimsa herself is a true black alpaca and we have bred her to our herdsire Windrush Jennifer’s Zindel who is a light fawn.  Shiimsa’s dam Chai (AB Iyiyiy) is a medium fawn but has grey and black genetics in her background.  When we bred Chai t0 Zin we got Kanika who is also true black.  Shiimsa’s sire Tobiano is dark brown but his sire was true black so we feel that we have a chance of Shiimsa producing a black cria from her breeding to Zin.  Then again at times it seems as if alpacas have not read the book on color genetics and we could end up with a totally unexpected color on Shiimsa’s cria.

 

Shiimsa’s owner Teri Faver of Almost Canyon Ranch is very much looking forward to the arrival of Shiimsa’s cria.  This will be the first cria born to Teri’s alpacas.  Teri plans on coming to visit Shiimsa this weekend and I think she will be surprised by how much Shiimsa’s “bump” has grown since she last saw her.  Teri will then have the anxious wait that all first time alpaca owners have for their first cria to be born.  Let’s hope Shiimsa does not go too far past her due date and keep Teri waiting too long, still at the end of the day as long as Shiimsa produces a healthy cria I suspect that Teri will not mind the extra wait!

 

Rosemary

 

 

Tragedy of the Shortage of Large Animal Vets

 

 

Moonie in happier times

 

This post is a difficult one to write, and if you love animals it will be difficult to read, but what happened here on the farm on Monday is one example of the consequences of a national shortage of large animal vets

 

On Sunday afternoon one of our herdsires Moonlight Surprise (Moonie) had a seizure.  Just before I went out to do afternoon chores I noticed a commotion in the adult males pen.  I thought they were just doing the usual wrestling and chasing, but then I realized something was wrong. 

 

I could see Moonie getting up and then being picked on by the other males, they were chest butting him and chasing him away from the male herd.  While the male alpacas do fight and squabble this was different, the other males were making a concerted effort to ostracize Moonie from the herd. 

 

As I watched I noticed Moonie was also running strangely with his neck straight out, he was following the fence line and there was something very odd about his behavior.

 

I went out and caught Moonie and realized that something was affecting his vision.  I prepared a small pen in the area where the younger males are and took Moonie over to that pen.  Moonie wasn’t blind, he had some limited vision allowing him to see things when he got close up to them, but his vision was not normal.

 

Moonie was distressed about his condition, his nostrils were flaring and he was unsettled.  I gave him some Bach’s Rescue Remedy and then showed him where the water and hay were in the pen.  I took his temperature which was 99.5 a little low but not terribly concerning.  A while later Moonie had another seizure, his body contracted pulling his neck to the right, followed by trembling of his head and rapid movement of his eye lids, he staggered as the seizure progressed.  As the seizure continued I did my best to make sure he didn’t hurt himself by falling against anything.  As Moonie came out of the seizure I could tell his vision had been affected again.  Moonie started following the fence line, walking round and round the pen.

 

This was not the first time we had known Moonie to have a seizure, about two years ago Moonie had been seen to have one.  He was in quarantine following a show at the farm of our alpaca neighbors Bob and Regina Dart.  Following shows we often quarantine our show string together.  It means that one farm can quarantine the boys and the other farm quarantine the girls often avoiding the situation where one alpaca is quarantined alone.  When Moonie had his first seizure the quarantine period had passed but we had not picked our alpacas up from the Darts farm.  That seizure was small and was followed by another about a week later.  Our vet examined Moonie and run some bloodwork on him but there were no clues as to why Moonie had those first two seizures.   Now two years later Moonie was having seizures again.

 

Being Sunday night our vet was not available, by the time nightfall came Moonie had calmed down and was quietly cushed in his pen.  He was not drinking any water or eating hay, but he did nibble on some pellets we put in his pen.

 

Monday morning came and Moonie was comfortably cushed in his pen.  We saw him get up and go to the poop pile and then again start eating the pellets in his bowl.  He seemed more alert and almost back to normal, but about an hour after we first saw him in the morning he had another seizure.

 

As soon as the vet clinic was open I called our vet.  Our vet told me that he was unable to come out to our farm that morning, his schedule was already fully booked, but he could see Moonie at 4 p.m. that afternoon.  Listening to my description of Moonie’s condition he was puzzled as to what could be going on with Moonie, but of course it is very difficult to diagnose a condition over the phone. 

 

By the time I spoke to our vet Moonie was going around and around in circles around his hay bucket, always circling to the right.  Moonie had also started alarm calling, indicating his level of distress to be high.  The poor boy couldn’t understand what was happening to him.

 

Our vet suggested I give Moonie a small dose of Acepromazine and some Thiamine to try and help Moonie remain stable and calm until the afternoon appointment.

 

Moonie was having seizures approximately every hour, the Thiamine did seem to help him and I was optimistic that the vet would be able to treat him later that day.  As the morning progressed though the seizures continued and started to get more severe each time.  As if that was not bad enough our vet then called me to say that he was not going to be able to get away from the client he was with and could not see Moonie that day.  I explained that Moonie was getting worse and asked what I should do, our vet suggested that I call another veterinary practice in Texas to see if they had any vets in our area.  

 

You might wonder why our vet suggested calling a veterinary practice in a neighboring state, we are after all in an agricultural community with a large number of cattle and horses, but the truth is that the vets who are contracted with the local dairies will not come out to see other clients.  The veterinary practice in Texas was our only other option.

 

Sadly the veterinary practice in Texas did not have anyone in our area, they offered for us to drive Moonie over to them but by this time Moonie was down and couldn’t get up.    At 2:30 p.m.  Moonie died.

 

I have had alpacas die before; sadly part of any livestock business is the inevitable death of some of your animals.  With the best care in the world at times things will happen that we cannot fix and animals die.  This death though was the hardest I have had to witness yet, my alpaca was suffering and even when I knew he was dying and tried to get a vet to come out to put him down the response I got was that the area vets were busy and could not help.  It is one thing to lose an alpaca, it is entirely different thing to have to watch that animal suffer in his final moments and not be able to do a thing to ease that suffering.  My only hope is that in those final moments Moonies brain had shut down to where perhaps he wasn’t feeling what was going on.

  

It is known that there is a national shortage of Large Animal Vets in the United States, a recent article in the Milwaukee Wisconsin Journal Sentinel refers to the problems that shortage presents, not just to livestock owners but also how that shortage could be a threat to national security.  What is worrying is that the situation is only likely to get worse.

 

Our large animal vet has been looking for another vet to join his practice for well over a year with no luck.  The number of veterinary college graduates who choose to specialize in large animal practice is small.  Trying to find a veterinarian who is of the caliber that our vet desires and who also wants to live in dry and dusty eastern New Mexico is a difficult task. 

 

I am sure our vet is not happy about the situation with Moonie; it cannot be easy for him to turn down a client with an emergency situation.   Our vet is just one person and if he is already dealing with another client’s emergency he cannot walk away from that emergency until he has completed whatever treatments he needs to administer.  How is he supposed to choose between two clients both urgently needing his services?  On speaking to his wife later in the day she described Monday as “a day from hell”.

 

Large animal veterinary practice is not a popular choice of career, the hours are long and the conditions are often filthy and demanding.  It takes a special person to be a large animal vet and while at times the job is rewarding that is apparently not enough to persuade people to become a large animal vet.

 

I wish I had a solution to the shortage of large animal vets in the US, if only to prevent another animal and owner from encountering the situation I did on Monday.  The only thing I can think to do is to sponsor organizations who have a scholarship scheme for veterinary students specializing in large animal practice.  

 

We do not know what caused Moonie’s seizures; we have submitted his body to the Texas Veterinary Medicine Diagnostic Lab (TVMDL) in Amarillo, Texas for a full necropsy.   We hope that something from that necropsy will shed some light on what was wrong with Moonie, but there is always a chance that the results of the necropsy will be inconclusive.

 

My heart breaks over the loss of my gentle herdsire Moonie.  He really was one of the gentlest alpacas, his easygoing nature inherited from his dam Carina.    Moonies fleece was very fine and consistent with little guard hair; a trait that is valued in the alpaca world and that made him a valuable part of our breeding program.

 

We had not used Moonie as much as we would have liked to, he currently has three offspring on the ground with a fourth one due later this spring.  One of his offspring is our Windrush Peruvian Tonka who we lovingly refer to as Little Man.  Ironically when Little Man was born he bore no resemblance to Moonie, but now as he grows his face is strikingly similar to that of his sire.  That similarity will now be part of Moonie’s legacy and in time we hope that Little Man will step in to take over the herdsire career that his sire was unable to complete. 

 

To my dear Moonie, I hope you understand that I did what I could for you; it was not enough to save you I know, but I don’t know what else I could have done.  I will truly miss you.

 

Rosemary

Weekend Visitors

 

This weekend we were visited by a local family who are contemplating having alpacas as pets and who are in the process of researching how to care for alpacas.  The family had some good and thorough questions and we enjoyed our time with them.  The alpacas all behaved well and we hope that the family’s time here was a good introduction to the world of alpacas.

 

I often hesitate to use the word “pet” when referring to alpacas.  According to my copy of the Oxford Dictionary a pet is “an animal tamed and kept as a favorite or treated with fondness”.  I guess that definition can apply to some alpacas, (I know our alpacas are certainly treated with fondness!) but when most people think of a pet they seem to think along the lines of the relationship they have with their pet dog or cat, a relationship that is a little different than you will have with an alpaca.

 

There are some alpacas that do enjoy some human interaction, coming up for a sniff, enjoying a scratch under the chin or just taking pleasure in being around you, but for the most part alpacas like to come to you on their terms, when they feel like it, and are not always keen on being touched or stroked by humans.  Most alpacas prefer the company of other alpacas over the company of humans.

 

Still that is not to say that people shouldn’t consider alpacas as a form of pet, but they do need to be aware of the type of relationship they are likely to be able to develop with an alpaca.  Alpacas are intelligent creatures and can be trained to do things such as going over obstacle courses, be therapy animals to brighten the day of those in hospitals and nursing homes and be walked using a halter and lead rope.  If you are hoping for more of a dog like relationship where you alpaca bounds up to meet you and can’t wait to spend time with you then you are likely to be disappointed.

 

To help people understand alpacas better and to assist them with deciding if alpacas are a suitable match for them a group of 10 alpaca breeders has put together a web site that offers facts, advice and opinions to help people decide if alpacas are a good choice for them. 

 

The site is located at http://webpages.charter.net/alpacaatlantic/pet.htm

 

Alpaca breeders are very fond of their alpacas.    While they are in the business of raising alpacas they also want to ensure that the alpacas they raise receive excellent care and are loved throughout their lifetime.  One thing alpaca breeders can do to achieve that is to educate prospective alpaca owners and also be there to mentor them as they get used to having alpacas of their own.  As with any animal alpacas are not “disposable” and the last thing any breeder wants to hear is of someone not adequately caring for their alpacas or just turning them loose to fend for themselves.  Reputable alpaca breeders have no hesitation in taking the time to educate and assist prospective and new alpaca owners in learning how to care for alpacas.

 

We were pleased to see our weekend visitors taking the time to learn about alpacas before making a purchase.   Their research and education will pay off in the long run and will make their alpaca ownership experience an enjoyable one.  We look forward to meeting them again and helping them in the future when the time comes for them to make their first alpaca purchase.

 

Rosemary

We Have Kittens!

Grey Cat now a proud mother of four kittens

 

Born Wednesday evening to our grey barn cat, four little furry bundles of joy! 

 

Last year our grey cat only had one kitten and she decided to have him in our chiminea.  Unfortunately the kitten did not survive, we think he was killed by one of the visiting tomcats.

 

This year grey cat continued her tradition of having her kittens in odd places by choosing an empty feed sack that was on top of our pile of unopened feed sacks.

 

The first indication we got that labor was imminent was when the usually reticent gray cat pushed past me as I was preparing the evening feed, crawled into the empty feed sack and then stuck her head out of the sack to hiss at me.  Well, that told me that in the grey cat’s opinion I needed to leave and I suspected that the kittens were on their way.  While the grey cat is quite wild she is not usually prone to hissing at us and so her behavior was a sign that something was happening.

 

I left the feed barn as soon as I could to give the grey cat some peace and quiet to have her kittens.  That night I dreamt that she had four kittens and it turned out she did, so either I am getting good at judging how many kittens are in a very full pregnant cat tummy or I am starting to have dream premonitions!

 

The next morning I checked on the grey cat and for a moment thought she was dead.  She lay heavily inside the feed sack, her eyes open but glazed over and she did not move when I called her.  Fearing the worst I started to open the sack to check on the exact condition of the cat when she sprung to life hissing at me.  Well that answered that question; she was definitely alive and had apparently been contentedly nursing her kittens.

 

Grey cat stayed in the feed sack with the kittens for most of Thursday making us wonder how we were going to get to a new bag of feed when we needed it.  Fortunately Ric was down in the area of the feed barn when he saw the grey cat leave the feed barn and was able to gently maneuver a feed sack out from under the one containing the kittens.

 

As far was we can tell there is one black kitten, one orange kitten, one gray kitten and one black and white kitten.  Hopefully this year they will survive, but with tomcats in the area the kittens are vulnerable.  We are trying to think of what we could do to allow the mother cat access to her kittens while preventing the neighborhood tomcats from also accessing them. 

 

We have always had barn cats at the farm, the alpacas get on well with cats and we like the cats as they keep the rodents and snakes down.   At the moment the only two adult cats we have are the mother grey cat and Kit Cat our part Siamese male cat who was dropped off here several years ago.  As both of those cats are aging it would be good to have a new generation to take over the mousing and snaking duties on the farm.

 

I suspect grey cat will move her kittens soon, she usually does, but in the meantime we will enjoy sneaking a peak at them in the feed sack while she is busy eating outside.

 

Rosemary

Reading Between the Lines

 

Now that the visiting alpacas quarantine period is over its time for us to get started with the breeding process so that we can get the alpacas pregnant and returned to their owners.

 

Orchid is going to be shorn prior to breeding, she is carrying a lot of fleece and it will be much safer to shear her first rather than shear her in the very early stages of pregnancy.

 

Marti arrived at our farm already shorn and so at the weekend we introduced her to our herdsire Treasure, who is the male Marti is to be bred to.  Marti initially ran a little, not completely unusual in an open alpaca, but sometimes it is an indication that she is not at the part of her cycle where she is most receptive to breeding.

 

Marti did cush for Treasure fairly quickly so we were optimistic that she would breed that day, however a short while later she stood up again.   We were not certain why Marti stood up; it was possible that she found the act of breeding painful in which case we would have needed to investigate things further.   Treasure again mounted Marti and again she cushed but shortly afterwards stood up.  At that point we decided that it was time to call a halt to the proceedings, as something was not right as far as Marti was concerned.

 

We knew that Marti had a reproductive work up prior to coming to us and that her owner’s vet declared her sound for breeding so we suspected that Marti’s behavior with Treasure was most likely due to her being in the wrong part of her reproductive cycle for breeding, even though she cushed quite readily for Treasure.

 

Yesterday we decided to try Marti with Treasure again so see if her behavior would be any different.  Again she ran a little but this time when she cushed she stayed cushed and allowed herself to be bred.  The breeding proceeded without any problems and Marti did not show any signs of discomfort during the breeding.

 

So Marti’s behavior at the first time of being put with Treasure was her way of saying that she was not receptive for breeding.  The fact that she cushed was a little misleading, but she is timid by nature and she may just have felt dominated by Treasure which caused her to cush.  Her behavior of standing up during the breeding was a more definite indication that she was not receptive to breeding at that time.

 

Alpacas have very distinct individual personalities and when it comes to breeding females it is helpful to know and understand their personality.  By getting acquainted with the various personalities it makes it a little easier to read the behavior of the female alpaca when she is introduced to a male.  In Marti’s case we knew her to be timid by nature and that helped us assess her behavior when first introduced to the male.

 

Apart from the biosecurity advantages of the three week quarantine that we enforce on alpacas coming onto the farm, it also gives us a chance to observe and get to know visiting female alpacas before introducing them to the male alpacas.   By being able to read their subtle signals and understand what they are trying to tell us by their behavior we are better able to assess where they are in their reproductive cycle or if there may be something else causing them to be non-receptive to breeding.

 

We will behavior test Marti in about a week to see if she will reject the male indicating that she has probably cycled, if so we may be on our way to achieving a successful pregnancy.  The process of breeding alpacas is not a difficult one, but it does take time, knowledge of alpaca reproductive behavior and the ability to be able to read between the lines to understand what the female alpaca is telling you.

 

 

Rosemary

There’s Nothing Quite Like A Good Auntie

Candytuft stands between Orchid and Ma Cushla (really girls you need to learn to chew with your mouths closed!)

 It has been interesting to watch the progress of young Candytuft who is here with her dam Orchid who is here for breeding.

 

When Candytuft first arrived she was very wary of us, not wanting to come near us at all, sticking closely to her dam’s side.  We didn’t force the issue, crias are curious by nature, I knew that if we just went about our business without making an attempt to interact with her that her curiosity would get the better of her.

 

In a short time Candytuft has progressed from running away as soon as she saw us, to peering around the side of her dam to watch us, to now coming up when we are putting out hay and gingerly taking some from our hands.  Candytuft is coming around and gradually starting to trust us.

 

Along with learning to trust us, Candytuft has also formed a bond with our grey alpaca Ma Cushla.  Ma Cushla has always been something of a herd auntie, she has never been able to carry a pregnancy to term and so has never had a cria of her own.  Instead Ma Cushla likes to be the auntie to the various crias at the farm.  Something about her attracts the crias to her; in return she is very gentle with them and even joins in with the crias when they have one of their “cria dashes” around the pasture.  Candytuft has been no exception to Ma Cushla’s charms.

 

While the other alpacas in the quarantine pen would all be at one hay feeder, it was not unusual to find Ma Cushla and Candytuft side by side at the other hay feeder eating together.  Orchid seems quite willing to leave her little one with Ma Cushla and shows no concern that her cria is not at her side as long as Candytuft is with Ma Cushla.

 

Orchid has now completed her quarantine period and we have put her and Candytuft in with the main herd.  Sometimes with visiting female alpacas we will leave them in the quarantine pen for the duration of their stay along with our two companion females Primera and Ma Cushla, but with Candytuft being the only cria in the quarantine pen we felt it was healthier for her to be able to interact with the other crias in the main herd.

 

The first day of Orchid and Candytuft being in with the main herd was strange to them, they didn’t know where to go to eat and had to get acquainted with the other girls in the pasture.  Orchid soon discovered which pen she would be fed in, Candytuft preferred to stay outside of the pen initially and on those first few days while Orchid was eating we would find Candytuft seeking out Ma Cushla and comfortably settling in beside her until Orchid had finished her feed.

 

Now Orchid and Candytuft are more settled in with the main herd.  Most times Candytuft now goes into a pen with Orchid to eat, but other times she stays out and seeks out the company of her favorite herd auntie Ma Cushla, proving that as is the case for many crias there’s nothing quite like a herd auntie for good company.

 

Rosemary

Easter Brings The Joy of Rain

Following a week of dust storms and severe winds, thankfully Easter weekend brought us some rain.  Not a huge amount, no torrential downpours (thankfully) but some nice steady rain.  The ground is still damp and the dust is not blowing even though the wind has again picked up speed a little.  While local families went on Easter Egg hunts, we had an Easter Egg hunt of a different kind, as we looked at the dry oval patches on the ground where the alpacas had cushed in the rain.  

 

The alpacas felt there was sufficient rain for them to go into their shelters at times, cushing down in the straw and chewing their cud as they settled down to watch the rain.  They were much more relaxed than when they had to cope with the high winds, then they would stick their heads out of the shelter and make a mad dash for a different shelter taking a more diagonal route than they had planned as the wind blew them sideways.  To give you an idea how powerful the wind was last week, the latch that holds our feed barn door open was ripped off by the wind and I used two bales of alfalfa to prop the door open, the bales weigh about 60 lbs each and were stacked on top of each other but the wind moved them with ease giving me an extra workout as I put them back in place each time the wind moved them.

 

As the rain continued some of the alpacas ventured out for a soaking, enjoying the feeling of the rain on their fleeces and hopefully washing out some of the dirt that has accumulated in their fleeces over the past months.

 

The upcoming week has a forecast of more rain – we will take whatever we can get and hope that it travels on to give Texas a good soaking too.  There have been some terrible grass fires in the past week in Texas and New Mexico and rain is much-welcomed friend to those fighting the fires.

 

As we prepare for shearing we are even more grateful to the rain, hoping to get the alpacas a natural rinse before we start to shear.  The dirt is hard on our shearing equipment and is something we would rather not have in our fleeces.  

One of the advantages of shearing our own herd is that we are not tied to a particular day as we are when we contract a shearer to shear, allowing us to adjust our shearing days a little to ensure we have dry fleeces to shear.

 

We will hope that the forecast is right for this week, the rain will help our struggling winter wheat grow and once it is a little stronger we can let the alpacas take turns grazing it – and then we will have a really happy bunch of alpacas!

 

Rosemary