day 354

Nothing from Consuella as of 10:30 this morning.

I did get a picture that proves she's pregnant, though. Look at that belly!

She likes sunning her tummy when the weather's nice. It's just that there normally isn't so much of it!

m

Consuella's late

For those who are counting, as I am, Consuella is on day 350 gestation. She's usually good for 345.

I thought FOR SURE she was in labor on Easter. I even called a neighbor who wanted to see the birth. Thank goodness I told her to wait to come over until I saw feet. I never saw feet.

The phrase "any day now" gets old. Now, I'm almost not expecting her to have a baby, but it will happen. I've seen the little critter try to escape a couple times already.

It looks like Consuella is smuggling a blimp. ha!

m

Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban buy four alpacas

http://lovelynicolekidman.com/article.asp?articleid=49351

The article linked above reads, in part:

"NICOLE Kidman and Keith Urban have fallen in love with their new mansion in the NSW Southern Highlands, and have added to their livestock with the purchase of four young alpacas."

Wow! There's an untapped market: celebrities! Could alpacas be the new Shar Peis?

Seriously, I think it's a great idea. If any of you know any celebrities, convince them that Alpacas are the new hot thing. If the "Kurbans" own them, you know it's gotta be hot!

m

Alpaca Shearing Video

just some fun news items to brighten your day.

http://www.tv3winchester.com/home/headlines/43002217.html#

Water-Cleaning Poo!
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2002/02/0205_0205TVllamadung.html

Meet Apu!

Apu Nahasapeemapetilon is the newest member of the Evergreen Terrace family. So it took us two weeks to settle on a name. We're lame and we know it.

m

Paca Talk #7 is posted!

http://www.pacatalk.com/

In this episode, we talk about taking a down alpaca to the veterinary hospital for an emergency.

Also, bits on the Chinese "Grass-mud horse," a brand-name candy commercial and a punk band...and yes, they all relate to alpacas.

Enjoy!
m

We Need a name

Actually, we'll need 5 names this summer if all goes well.

We name our alpacas after characters in the TV show "The Simpsons." Most of you had already figured that out (El Barto, Milhouse, Manjula, etc.).

Anyone have some awesome suggestions for names for this year's batch of crias? Comment them below!

m

New Cria!

Cabernet had a baby this morning. He weighs in at about 15 1/2 lbs. He is about six days early, which accounts for his unsteadiness, but the vet checked him out and says everything is okey-dokey.

As of now, he doesn't have a name, but I'll be sure to post it once we settle on one.

Consuella is due April 4, and Lisa is due April 20, so we'll soon have a pack of babies playing together. Yippee!

m

Any minute now...

Cabernet, our big 1/2 Accoyo girl, is due any day now with a cria from Thomas of Alpaca Junction. She has a habit of delivering about two weeks early, so we are on cria watch now. We've got our cria kit ready, we watch her from the house while she's in the field. I even have Charles trained to peek at her udder to see if it's filling (a sign she's getting close).

Plus, she's as big as a whale and obviously uncomfortable. She's gone stiff-legged in her back end from the extra weight.

After she's done, Consuella and Lisa are both due in April with El Barto babies. His first baby, Majula, was born last year, and is a beauty.

Back to the window for a Cabernet check!
m

Alpaca Blanket Project

Alpaca News Item:

Peter and Carol Lundberg are alpaca friends of ours. This article is a little old, but the story keeps being picked up by the papers, so I thought I'd share:

http://www.statesmanjournal.com/article/20090211/COMMUNITIES/902110424/1133

We hope to interview them about the blanket project on the Paca Talk podcast ( www.pacatalk.com ) in the near future.

m

pooptacular!

http://www.newerspreader.com/newmodel.htm

Our shiny new manure spreader. Charles's dream come true.

He actually sold his English sports car so he could buy this. Sad, but true. It was NOT Maren's idea, either.

We'll let you know how it works out once we play with it some. :)

m

Alpaca 401 (k)

http://www.kmbc.com/cnn-news/17741606/detail.html

Our herd has doubled in value since we bought the orginal 4 animals four years ago. Not bad, especially considering the current economic turmoil.

Of course, just like stocks and bonds, to get that money we'd have to sell the alpacas. Maybe next year. :)

maren

Alpacas in the WSJ!

This article was on the front page of the Wall Street Journal!

"When Stocks Tank, Some Investors Stampede to Alpacas and Turn to Drink"

Here's a couple lines of the article...

"Peggy Parks, a 49-year-old auditor in Johnstown, Pa., turned to an unusual farm animal. "I've lost a fortune in stocks, and my 401(k) is falling through the floor. I feel comfortable in alpacas," she says. She invested $56,000 in a small herd that she believes has a better outlook than most mutual funds because of the animals' breeding potential.

The national Alpaca Registry Inc., in Lincoln, Neb., says registrations are on pace to rise 7% this year and currently stand at 140,297. Ms. Parks says a female of "medium quality" can fetch $10,000 and that prices have been rising, supporting her hopes that she'll see a profit on her alpaca portfolio in five years."

I'm interested in the idea that alpacas are seen by some as a sounder investment than stocks. I don't think I would go so far as to recommend people by alpacas as their sole investment. However, they are far cuter than most portfolios, and have a long track record of increasing the value of their herd (by reproducing).

I think it's great. I love front-page advertising.

m

Purchases!

http://www.alpacanation.com/alpacasforsale/03_viewalpaca.asp?name=22744

We're in the process of buying this black alpaca and her baby girl!

We haven't bought an alpaca since the first three (plus cria). I'll save the details until we've 1) closed the deal and 2) talked about it on Paca Talk (www.pacatalk.com).

Eee! This is exciting!

m

Paca Talk is on iTunes!

Hi Everyone!

Our podcast, Paca Talk (Pacatalk.com), is now on iTunes! You can search for "Paca Talk" or "alpaca podcast," and it will come up. Or click here to open iTunes on your computer.

I suspect that I'll be focusing less attention to this blog since we have the podcast going on, and it will have information about goings on on this farm. Our new human baby has taken up much of the time I had been spending on this blog, anyway.

Episode #1 of Paca Talk will be posted within a couple days.

maren

Paca Talk is live!

Paca Talk is our new alpaca podcast!

Check out our first "teaser" episode, which is posted on the blog:

http://www.pacatalk.com

Look for us on iTunes soon!
maren

New Baby!

Well, okay, he isn't so new. I've been busy (read "8 months pregnant") and I haven't been updating this as I should.

Principal Skinner (a.k.a. "Seymore") was born to Dawn on 10/3/07. Charles walked into the barn and found him...the best kind of birth as far as I'm concerned. He is white and male, but he is a son of Patchacuti, so he is beautiful. He's healthy, though not nearly the bruiser that Rainier was at birth. Seymore weighed in at about 14# when he was born. Now he's up to 23#. Rainier must be 45# by now.

We took Dawn to Northwest Alpacas on Saturday for a drive-by breeding to Cannonero, one of only two or three fawn studs up there. Dawn is a funny animal. During the breeding she ate hay and then she laid down on her side. We think the unusual position was because Cannonero is a big beast, and she's little. She must have thought he was too heavy. It was a good, long breeding, though, and we got to take her home on the same day. I like this "drive by" trend.

That's all for now. I'll post pictures soon.
maren

Map of WABA farms for Alpaca Farm Day

This is just a test/proof of concept page for now. Neat, huh?
m




View Larger Map

New baby!

Welcome to Rainier Wolfcastle!

He was born on August 18, 2007, at around 8:30 a.m., and weighed in at nearly 21 lbs.! His mother is Cabernet, who was on progesterone because we thought she was due two weeks later. His father is Hakuna Matata, who now resides on the East Coast.

We're pleased at how robust this little guy is. He has gained six pounds in a week! Normally, you can expect cria to gain 8 oz. a day, but he has put on nearly a pound a day. The vet thought he looked two weeks old on the day he was born.

A boy isn't a girl, but we're pleased with strong babies one way or another.

m

Cute picture of the day

Cute Picture of the Day!

This was taken sometime in May, I believe.

This is what is known as "Velcro fleece."

maren

Far too long since I've posted...

Hello!

It's been too long since I posted, so here is a brief update:

HOTV show 2007: Lisa (left) received no ribbons. G. K. Willie won a fourth place out of ten! Yippee!

Willamette Valley Alpaca Fleece Show 2007: Wille got a second place, Bart and Lisa got 3rd and 4th places, and there is one more fleece that I forget about.

Everyone is now pregnant.

I'll post more info and pictures once life settles down here.
m

catch up

It's been a long time, so here's a summary:

1. El Barto and Consuella have conceived! We don't know how long ago, since Consuella is notorious for hiding her pregnancies. We'll ultrasound her this summer when we have sometime and money.
2. The boys are now sleeping under the stars so that we can get some grass growing in their pasture which is attached to the barn. They are enjoying the fresh grass, and seem to be used to their tent-shelter now. (pictures to come)
3. We had El Barto and Duffy shorn last weekend so that we can enter their fleeces in the Willamette Valley Alpaca Fleece Show on May 19-20. They have been cold and picked on by the other boys all week. Bart opened a new can of whoop-ass to keep the minions in line.
4. The Heart of the Valley Alpaca Show is Mother's day weekend in Albany. Go see the website that Charles and I designed. We'll have two baby alpacas entered.
5. The rest of the herd is going to be shorn on May 19.
6. Charles and I are starting a web design business aimed at small farmers and others who need a custom website and easy data management.
7. I am teaching five different classes this quarter, so I am meeting myself coming and going. Whew!

That's enough for now. I'll have pictures of shearing and the show later.

m

Wow! It is so pretty here.

We don't get a lot of snow here in the Willamette Valley, but it is pretty when we get some. This is about 1/2" that came through in Jan or Feb 07. It was gone by the end of the week.




This other picture is of the tracks we found that evening leading into and out of the barn. They are of some canine, although we don't know if it is coyote or just a random dog. I haven't had my friends in the biology dept. look at it yet.

We have been pasture-breeding Bart and Consuella for about a week now. The idea is that they will have the whole day to "do it," and perhaps without the "pressure" they will conceive. She's been spitting off for a couple days now, so they are in their separate pastures. We'll spit-test them in a week.

Wish us luck! Our next step will have to be fertility testing.

m

January update #1

Here's the cute picture of the day. This is from the first snow this winter, about two days before Thanksgiving. Milhouse and Charles are caught in a private moment. :)

So much has happened in the last two months that I'm going to have to update you in stages. This post is going to be abotu breedings.

-------------------
First, Dawn is pregnant and at home. We had no problem re-breeding her to Patchacuti. She was actually bred the day we dropped her off, and she took the first time. We picked her up this last weekend, and have her in minor quarantine for a couple weeks.

We were not so lucky with Consuella and Barto. She remains not pregnant (according to her progesterone scores). The question is, who's to blame? Is it Barto, the young, inexperienced stud? Or is it Consuella, with her confounding biology which confused the vest at NWA for two months with false negative pregnancy tests? We don't know, so we're going to have some testing done in the near future. We've stopped breeding them for the time being because it is too late in the season for babies to be born (it's snowing AGAIN today, for example).

So, that's the breeding update. Watch for hay and website updates soon!

maren

Alpacas in Smart Money!

http://www.smartmoney.com/smallbiz/index.cfm?story=20061218

So, you want to start an alpaca farm? This links to a story about starting a small business while keeping your "day job," and it includes a couple that started an alpaca farm while remaining teachers. It's what Charles and I did.
m

Evergreen Terrace's X-mas 2006

Hello everyone!

We've had a busy year, naturally, and it took a couple of interesting turns. We've have a pretty good year with the alpacas, artistic endeavors, website building, consulting and caring for family members.

First of all, Maren has been busy writing, but branched out this year into filmmaking as well. Maren and a friend made two short films together this year. One was a documentary about alpacas at the Heart of the Valley Alpaca show.

The alpacas are doing great. (Snowball is the Rudolf impersonator in the picture.) We have two adorable babies who were born at the end of the summer. They play together and are endlessly entertaining. The male, Willie, was born two weeks early, but he is robust now, and the color of a new penny. The girl, Lisa, was born a month later, and is a very light fawn.

We have had a productive year entering alpaca fleeces in fleece shows. Bart and Duffman have each won one fleece ribbon, but Milhouse has won two, including third place out of a class of fourteen in a spin-off competition. We are very proud.

We want to reiterate that everyone is welcome to come visit us on the ranch.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Charles, Maren, Tigger, the kitties, and the alpacas.

November Updates and random photo

This is the random alpaca picture of the day. Milhouse was backlit nicely by the sunset in September.










It’s about time for us to spit-test and progesterone test Consuella. It has been three weeks since her last breeding with Barto. I hope that all tests show her to be solidly pregnant, but given the difficulty the pros at NWA had in finding her pregnancy last year, I’m fearful that she will be equally difficult to pin down this year.

In other news, the rains have come back and, despite our French drain, the barn still floods. However, we aren’t in the “water flowing through the barn” stage or the “water standing in the barn” yet as we were last year. We have some mud, and a pool of water where the clay floor of the barn is saturated with urine. The boys are a muddy mess. We have made progress, but it is still disheartening that there is still so much water in that stall.

Maybe we should build a dike next year.

Breeding updates

Cabernet has been confirmed pregnant with a progesterone test. Later on in the season, we may ultrasound her, but we didn't last year, so I don't think it is necessary.

Consuella's progesterone was so low that we decided to tease her again with Kuna. It could just be that she doesn't accept El Barto's authority yet, so to speak. He'll get more macho as he matures.

Anyway, Kuna was able to get Consuella down, and Bart was right there to finish the job (after 1/2 hour!). A few days later, we brought Kuna back to tease her again, and she spit and threw a fit. She did the same thing on Tuesday, so we're pretty sure she thinks she's pregnant. We'll tease her and do another progesterone test in a couple weeks to confirm it.

However, we won't be able to tease her with Kuna anymore. Polly was able to sell him to someone in Connecticut. He's leaving in a couple days. Polly is sad, but he'll be happy as a clam there with all sorts of girls to play with.

Our final bit of news is that Dawn is at NWA for her date with Pachacuti. This is a re-breeding because she lost her pregnancy sometime last spring. She was bred on Saturday, and spit off on Tuesday. They'll try again on Friday, but she may have taken on the first try this time. Keep your fingers crossed!

So, we may finally have everyone pregnant. Yippee!

2006 Fiber Odyssey Spin-off ribbon

Milhouse won a ribbon!

Back in July I sent off 2 oz. of Milhouse's fleece to Idaho for this spin-off contest, and promptly forgot about it until I received this package in the mail today!

Milhouse won third place in the Fawns for his fleece, out of FOURTEEN entries! He lost the most points for lack of crimp and architecture in his fleece, but obviously, that isn't enough to hold back a nice yarn!

I'm so proud. :)

m

Alpacamania

The Alpacamania show was October 7 and 8 in Medford, Oregon. I had never competed in a show besides Heart of the Valley, so I was eager to bring one of our animals to an outside show, plus I wanted to take Duffman to a show before the next HOTV in May when he will be 20 months old. I convinced Polly McCrea to send a couple of her animals along, too, so that we could split the price of a pen.

The animals we brought were: Duffman, our Hemingway grandson; Eli, Polly's Tocto son; and Montiero, Polly's black boy who won a ribbon at HOTV '06. We supposed that Montiero had a really good chance of winning a ribbon, Duffy had a chance if he had 2 testicles that day (since he had a habit of hiding one), and that Eli was just there for kicks.

It turns out that Eli, who was scared spitless the entire show, was the one who won a blue ribbon. The judge was very impressed with his "showmanship," which floored me. I didn't even think he was talking about us as he went on and on about how well this animal was showing, etc.





Duffy ended up with a fourth place ribbon out of four, even though his testicle was nowhere to be found. The judge was very kind about giving us a ribbon for what can be a disqualifying fault.





Monty didn't get a damned thing, which was the biggest surprise of the show. However, it was understandable. He was in a class of thirteen, all but two of which were older than he. They were all lovely, and the first and second places were won by near-two year olds. It was disappointing. However, I have never seen such a strong class of black animals.

We spent the time we weren't showing talking to people and handing out flyers for El Barto's stud services and Polly's retirement sale of alpacas and her ranch. (See her alpacanation [http://www.alpacanation.com/farmsandbreeders/03_viewfarm.asp?name=10257] site for more information.) I gave out all of Polly's flyers and I had to make more copies of ours since I left one at every stall at the show, and handed them out to people. We hope to get one or two breedings for Bart out of it (which would pay for the show, plus some), and maybe sell some of Polly's animals.


Plus, the show was lots of fun. :)

Barnyard surgery

Dawn isn't going to NWA this weekend because we had the huge, quarter-sized corn removed from her hind foot yesterday. The vet (and us) was eager to take off the corn because 1) it continued to grow, 2) Dawn isn't pregnant or lactating, 3) we weren't 100% sure it was a corn (read: we hoped it wasn't a tumor). So the vet sedated her, and removed it right there in the barnyard.

Now, my little brother is a surgery resident, and I'll bet he had never sutured something while kneeling in the gravel while shooing stray chickens away.

All went well, and Dawn is now sporting a pink bandaged leg.

This does complicate re-breeding her because, ideally, we'd keep her on our farm until the stitches are out...another 2 weeks. This presents two problem: 1) the stud we'd like to re-breed her to leaves at the end of October, and 2) the later we breed her, the more likely she'll have her baby after school starts.

So much for my well-thought-out plan for pre-school cria. :)

Dawn isn't pregnant

We had some disappointing news before I left for Alpacamania on Oct 5. We had a couple people look at Dawn and they confirmed our worst fear: Dawn isn't pregnant. I had been saying for some time that she wasn't big enough to be late-term, but I held out hope.

It turns out that Dawn is actually just fat. This is a first for her. We think she lost the baby when she was so sick in the spring with diarrhea,and she became so painfully thin. We changed her diet to a high-calorie, high-fat feed and put her on a daily diet of probiotics. That fattened her up, but it must have been after she lost the pregnancy.

The bad news is that we've lost a year of "production" out of her. The good news is that she is fat and happy and is in perfect condition to get pregnant. We're working out the details for when she can go back to NWA and see Pachacuti again sometime this month.

El Barto does his job!

El Barto has done his job in one try!

The female we bred to El Barto, Consuella, has spit him off twice! This usually means that a female is pregnant! We will have her progesterone tested in a couple weeks to make sure.

This is good news because it shows that not only is El Barto a potent stud, but that he can "get the job done" in one try! This will be useful information to give people who'd like to use him as a mobile herdsire (the sale is still on, everyone!).

Still still waiting

We're on Day 16 of being over due, Dawn! It's time to have a baby so that Charles and I can get on with our lives!

So much for planning. We had it all worked out so that the critters would be done birthin' by the time school started. We also had it worked out so that the babies would be born within 2 weeks of each other so that we wouldn't be on cria watch forever.

Then Cabernet had her baby 2 weeks early and Dawn is working on 2 1/2 weeks late (so far). Consuella was two days late, which was basically right on time.

Alpacas are such contrary animals. Dawn keeps looking at us like, "What?" whenever we look at her through the binoculars from the kitchen. The baby is kicking and rolling around inside her and seems very interested in getting out.

Ugh, it's frustrating. But that is the way it goes.

I am now trying to plan what to do next weekend when we are going to Central Point, Oregon, for an alpaca show. If Dawn hasn't popped before then, we are going to have to make more arrangements than if she has had her baby. Hiring a farm sitter is much more expensive than having my mom come out to feed the critters at night. The farm sitter would have to sit at the farm and watch Dawn, assist during the potential birth and call the vet if necessary. It's more time consuming because she can't leave the farm at all before noon, and has to check on Dawn every couple hours after that.

Well, the good news is that the baby is still alive inside her, and she is healthy and happy (if pig-headedly stubborn and uncaring about how inconvenient she is).

Still waiting on Dawn

Dawn is now eight days late. She's going to mess up our plans if she doesn't have her baby soon.

She has minimal udder development, but her hind-end is definitely relaxed (it jiggles when she walks). Her vulva is slightly larger, but not enough to scream "Today!" at me. She passed what we think was a mucus plug on Monday, but that can happen several days before actual birth.

We are planning on sneaking off to the coast on Saturday as my birthday present. It would suck mightily if we had to put that off because Dawn was still waiting to deliver. The weather is supposed to be perfect this weekend, and there are no guarantees about next weekend.

Plus, school starts on Monday, and I have to teach beginning at 10 am. This means that Charles would have to take care of things on Monday, were she to deliver. That isn't to say that he couldn't take care of things, but we would both prefer that both of us were there for the event.

The baby is kicking and thrashing about inside her, so we know it's alive and well. The baby isn't doing the creepy Aliens thing as Lisa was inside her momma, but it's still a little odd to see it writhing about in there.

Anyway, any day now we'll have another cria to coo over. I'm thinking I'd like to re-breed Dawn just a week earlier so that next year she won't bump up so close to the start of school.

We are planning a mobile breeding for Dawn at NWA, too, since she had that allergic reaction in August. We'd like to keep an eye on her. I think we'll be using their stud Impact this year.

That's all for now!
m

Link to Alumna profile

http://www.alumnae.mtholyoke.edu/profile/profile_anderson.php

I had been looking for this since February when the article came out. I finally found it!

This is a link to the article published about me and our alpaca farm in the Mount Holyoke Alumna Quarterly. I was interviewed in September 2005.

Enjoy!

Little Lisa has arrived!

This is baby Lisa!

She the first female cria born on our ranch, so we are very excited!

We worked outside until 12:30 PM this morning. Consuella (mom) was acting normally. Her teats weren't any larger than they have been in the last week, she was eating fine, and her vulva wasn't any larger than it has been this week.




However, after we showered and had worked for a bit, Charles peeked out the window. He called to me, saying, "Hey, what's that next to Consuella?"

That something turned out to be little Lisa. Sneaky Consuella had delivered all by herself, without showing any signs of labor, hard or otherwise. In fact, if Lisa weren't white, Charles might have mistaken her for Willie and not said anything. Consuella certainly looked content and unconcerned.




We went to the pasture to take a look. Lisa popped up to standing and then tottered over to get a drink. She must have been less than half an hour old because she was still wet.

We decided to towel-dry her and dip her umbilical cord in iodine while we were in the pasture. This is a much more difficult feat than it was with Cabernet's baby because Consuella hates it when people touch her babies. She bites and spits, so one of us had to hold a towel up for protection while the other dove in and worked with the baby.



After a couple hours of quiet (away from boisterous Willie), we swapped pastures so that Willie and his mom could be in the barn and Lisa and her mom could be outside without being bounced. We hope that he will wear himself out running the fence so that when everyone is in the barn tonight, he won't have the energy to play too roughly. Otherwise, we might have to separate them in a separate stall.


Well, that was exciting! I'll get statistics and details for you later!


maren

Herdsire Stud fee sale!

El Barto
Introductory mobile stud fee special
Sliding scale $550-$950 until 1-1-07

This is our stud, El Barto. We are offering a fall 2006 sale for the first five breedings (total) on his stud fee for mobile breedings. We don't have the facililities for traditional breedings (we don't have a proper quarantine area), so this is our compromise.

El Barto has lovely, 19 micron fleece with high-frequency crimp. It is delicious to work with.

He is a Glacial Storm son and an Augustus grandson. He is also the son of our import Dawn who has incredible 22 micoron fleece at NINE years old.

Go to our website for details: http://www.et-farms.com/herdsire.html

We'll go up to 100 miles for the cost of the breeding, and charge $.75 mile thereafter.

m

Still waiting on Consuella

Consuella is due tomorrow, but we've been watching her closely for the last two weeks. I have been sure that she was going to deliver a couple different times this week because of a couple things: 1) her udder is pretty full, although not engorged, and 2) the "alien" thing.

On Monday I noticed that something was moving under Consuella's tail. There was a bulge by her anus that was moving in and out. It was very creepy looking, but it was obviously the cria's feet. I thought, "Aha! The cria is in position and so Consuella is going to have her baby today!"

Not so.

I saw the feet again on Tuesday. "Surely today!" I thought. Nope.

We've seen the feet moving every day since, and Consuella still shows no signs of going into labor. She is very content to eat, chew her cud and look at us with her wise look, mildly puzzled by our attempts to look at her backside.

The best news out of all this is that there are feet in the birth canal. This is much better than any other single body part. I'm not even concerned whether they are front or back feet. Feet in the birth canal mean that we should have an uneventful birth (knock on wood).

Eventually, anyway.
m

Dawn Scare

We had a scare yesterday with our 10-year-old import, Dawn. At breakfast, she was normal, wolfing down her pellets, etc. When we got back outside to scoop poop, she was standing with her head down, drooling and coughing. She was obviously miserable.

I called another alpaca owner who has many more years of experience than we do and asked her what she thought we should do. We decided it was probably a case of "choke" where a blob of food gets caught in the esophogus and the alpaca tries to cough it up. You are supposed to massage the neck to see if there are any hard lumps and then try to break it up with your fingers. I tried this, but I couldn't feel any lumps.

We finally called the vet after about an hour of Dawn alternately coughing or standing very still going "uhn, uhn, uhn," and then holding her breath. The vet told us to get her into the barn where it was probably cooler (it got up to 94 yesterday).

By the time the vet arrived, Dawn was much worse. She had cushed down and was looking more and more depressed. The excitement of shooing her into the barn had caused another coughing fit and she was exhausted. She didn't even get up to get away from the vet, although she spent the entire visit with him screaming as only Dawn can (this made listening to her lungs difficult).

Dr. MacGuire heard fluid on her lungs and decided that perhaps she was having an allergic reaction to something. He gave her an antihistamine, a diuretic, and a tranquilizer that acted as a mild cough suppressant. Within five minutes she was breathing better, coughing less, and within an hour (after the vet had gone) she was up and eating.

We don't know what caused this reaction, but we have a syringe of antihistamine in the fridge from now in just in case. I'm thinking that she may have been stung by a bee or something.

It's the weirdest thing.

Alpaca comics

http://www.et-farms.com/gallery.html

Check out our new gallery. Not only do we have pictures up on Flickr.com, but I have discovered another time-wasting device: a program called "Comic Life" which allows one to take photos or drawings and plop them into a comic format. It has automatic speech balloons. So fun!

I've posted the first alpaca comic, entitled "Pool Party!" Enjoy.

m

Mobile Breeding

http://www.ideal-alpaca.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=feature.display&feature_id=160

We are going to try mobile breeding with El Barto. We are not really in a position to quarantine animals sent to us effectively, so we think that this is a good compromise. We can disinfect a trailer and get health certificates more easily than we can build a quarantine pasture.

This link is to Mike Safley's article on mobile breeding.

m

More baby pictures

He's so handsome!

Look at that bright fiber!

So content.

We are now over 26#, so he's put on ten pounds since he was born three weeks ago.

We are thinking of calling him "ETF G.K. Willie" for Grounds Keeper Willie on the Simpsons, the only character on that show that has red hair.

Flikr address

http://www.flickr.com/photos/et-farms_alpacas/

I'm lazy. I admit it. I am going to forgo re-vamping the photo gallery on our website in favor of using super-easy Flikr.

I've got some photos up already. Take a peek!
maren

Cria update #3

Well, Cabernet's cria is 2 1/2 weeks old, 24# 4oz., and is acting like a normal cria. He is running laps around the pasture for the sheer joy of it. He's chewing on our pantslegs for the fun of it. And he's getting into trouble, like "bouncing" his mother and his aunties, again for the fun of it.

Polly (our alpaca friend) says he is a very lovely little boy, and shows signs of being herdsire quality. Yippee!

He is still unnamed, but Apu and G.K. Willie (for Grounds Keeper) are the front-runners for now. Willie is the only character on the Simpsons with red hair (besides Ron Howard).

In other news, we are going to take Duffman to his first show in October. We are also taking two of Polly's little boys since she is going to a wedding that weekend. See you at Alpacamania!

m

Another use for alpaca geldings?

http://www.orthodoxanarchist.com/2006/07/alpaca-warfare.php

Just in case you thought alpacas were all love and fuzz.

m

Cria update #2

It's been a tiring few days since our little baby boy was born. As we indicated before, he was two weeks preemie, so we had been administering TLC until yesterday. This included waking him up every two hours (during the day) and encouraging him to eat and milking his mother and squirting milk down his throat once or twice a day.

TLC seems to have worked! It took him until Thursday to begin acting like a normal baby alpaca; that is, doing some running, nibbling on leafy things, and going on exploration missions away from mom.

He was able to cush upright with his head up without shaking by Tuesday night. Before he would topple over and then just give up and sleep all stretched out. The vet was very worried when he saw the cria on Sunday because the baby was practically unresponsive until we walked up to him and picked him up.

Now the baby fights us when we pick him up instead of hanging limp. This makes it somewhat difficult to weigh him since he messes up the reading on the hanging scale when he kicks. We are certainly not complaining, though. Better to have an inaccurate weight due to kicking than an accurate reading due to lethargy!

I am no longer deeply worried about this little boy. I think he's going to make it. We still have a couple days of antibiotics to get through, but I am very pleased with his progress so far.

Now we just need a name!

m

Cabernet cria update

Cria naptime

Here are the statistics:

Dam: Cabernet
time: 4:40 pm
time standing: 6:40 pm
time nursing: 7 pm
weight: approx 16# (our scale is inaccurate and our new scale hasn't arrived yet)

We called the vet this morning because the little guy just wasn't vigorous. Normally, crias are actually running around by the time they are a few hours old. This little guy is still tottering around unsteadily when he isn't sleeping in a coma-like state. The vet couldn't find anything obviously wrong with him, so he put him on a course of antibiotics just in case and give him his vaccines. If we're worried about him not eating enough we are supposed to milk (!) Cabernet (surprisingly, she lets us do this) and feed him with a syringe, but I think he's nursing enough that we won't actually need to do this.

Cabernet delivered this cria at 11 months, instead of 11 1/2 months, just as she has for the previous two crias. Also, like the last cria, she delivered this little guy in the evening, not the morning. She just has to be different, but at least we've identified a pattern.

We hope that a little extra nurturing will give the little (as yet unnamed) guy a chance to catch up. It's all we can do for now.

But he is extra cute. This picture is of him taking a nap on Charles's lap after we fed him some of his mom's milk with a syringe last night.

:)
m

Cabernet's Cria

Here he is!

Cabernet's cria arrived at 4:40 PM today, and weighs in at about 16 lbs.

More later. I'm sooo tired.

m

Four weeks to go!

Oh, so pregnant alpaca!

Cabernet is due in 4 weeks, August 13th. The last two years she's had her babies two weeks early, so we are going to begin watching next week, even though "cria watch" traditionally begins two weeks prior to the due date.

You can see in this picture how low she is carrying the baby. Usually, her tummy is tucked way up above her knee. It is now approaching her knee, and may be below her knee when she is close to her due-date.

So funny. So fat alpaca.

m

Alpaca Wethers as livestock guardians

http://kadina.yp-connect.net/~ypct/news/06/07/04/3.html
This article is about using alpaca wethers (gelded males) as livestock guardians in Australia. I had a phone call a few months ago from someone on the East coast asking about using alpacas as guardians because someone on her farm was afraid of llamas because of their size. I told her to buy two alpaca geldings and use them together as guardians.

The main problem with using alpacas as opposed to llamas as guardians is that alpacas are at a size disadvantage. However, most predators will back away from a challenge, and my alpacas (even my pregnant girls!) will challenge stray dogs and coyotes. The advantage may be in numbers, however. I still recommend that people get two alpacas because they don't seem to bond to other livestock the same way that llamas do and get lonely without another alpaca. However, according to the article, they still bond to the flock and will protect it.

I think this is a great use for gelded males who might not have the best fiber, especially the assertive ones. I am certainly going to use this article as a marketing tool for my fiber males.

m

Six weeks to go!

I will have pictures of the very pregnant Cabernet later this weekend. She is smuggling basketballs in that tummy, I swear.

Cabernet has had trouble with her last two babies so we have all our fingers and toes crossed for luck that she will carry this little one to term and deliver it without assistance. She deserves to be a mommy again.

That said, she is being a righteous b**** at the moment. She tries to steal food from the other girls and hogs the hay bin whenever she can. We try to excuse her by saying that she is pregnant and hot, but really, Cabernet just likes to be boss, and so she is bossy and demanding, even when she isn't pregnant.

I can't wait to have little cria bouncing around again! They are sooo frigging cute.

Pray for girls.

maren

baby pool

How many alpacas can you fit into a baby pool?

I promised you pictures!

It hit about 80 degrees today, so I filled the baby pool. This is what happens when the girls hear the water against the plastic.

Spitting ensued shortly thereafter. Here's a shot of the "winner."

Dawn wins!

In other news, we are baby-sitting a due-any-second-now alpaca of Polly's because she is out of town overnight. There could be cria pictures this weekend! Or, we could just sit around and watch her play dead (like the alpacas previous posts).

m

shearing update

Quickly, the shearing went well on Saturday. As is typical, Dawn shreiked like a banshee (you think I'm exaggerating, don't you?) the whole time, and Consuella just accepted it.

The excitement came when we were shearing little Snowball, a.k.a. Ringo. He was cut by the shearers. He didn't even flinch, but the rest of us were very upset. We closed the wounds with superglue (it's what it was designed for, you know), and slathered triple antibiotic ointment on it. It is now healing fine.

I need to get an "after" picture of Snowball up. He looks even less like his "before" picture than the fuzzy alpacs do.
m

What happened to these 'pacas??

What happened to these alpacas?

Actually, they are sunbathing. The first couple times you see this out your window, you go rushing out thinking that they are dead. They sit up when you get close and look at you expectantly. "Well? What did you wake me up for?"

This also demonstrates what the weather is like here. We only have a few more hours of "Spring," which is nice because it has been rainy and cool here since one freak weekend in May when it hit 90 degrees. Now it is 70 degrees with the promise of summer-like 80s next week.

When it gets that warm, the alpacas seek out the shade. I also fill up the baby pool for them. They love that so much that they fight over it. I'll have picutures, I promise.

m

Pre-shearing Pictures

Snowball, a.k.a. "Ringo," pre-shearing

I'm just preparing for Saturday when our final three alpacas will be shorn. This is our only suri alpaca. Notice how his fleece is twisted and stringy, not fluffy like the other alpacas. This is a genetic variation that is actually a dominant gene, but suri alpacas were nearly wiped out by the Spanish sheep hundreds of years ago because they can't stand the cold as well as their huacaya cousins.

The other two to be shorn are Dawn and Consuella, both of who are due in September. This is a little late to shear them, but it is still a week earlier than we were going to shear them originally.

Alpaca pregnancies are a little delicate the first three months and the last three months of an 11 1/2 month term. They are pretty solid those middle six months, but immediately after breeding and approaching delivery, you don't want to stress the mammas. They can and do re-absorb pregnancies during the first three months and they can abort during the last three months. This means that we like to get stressful things like shots and shearing done in that six-month window, or do it between birth and re-breeding (about a 2 week window).

We're pushing it with Dawn and Consuella as they are due between 10 and 12 weeks from now. I think it will be okay, though, since both of them have had many unproblematic pregnancies.

However, I am going to be far more vigilant in the future to schedule shearing in May when all of the girls will still be in that six month "safe zone." I'll sleep better at night if I do.

In other news, Cabernet is due in eight weeks. This means that cria watch will begin approximately the last week of July. This might be a problem with filming the movie this summer, but we'll cross that bridge when we get to it.

That's all for now.
m

Fleece show Update!

This is Duffman's Fleece. He won a 3rd place ribbon!



This is Milhouse's fleece. He won 2nd place!



This is our display. I shared with Polly from Fernhill Alpacas.



This is my entry in the fiber arts contest. I won 1st place!

It was a good show for ribbons, but I didn't sell a blamed thing. Oh well. I'll pick the fleeces and send them off for processing.

I'm thinking of using the black yarn from Tony for myself. I'm thinking shawl.

ta
m

Skirting table

As you can tell, I've figured out how to post photos to this blog.

Above is a shot of my skirting table in our embarrassing skirting room (a.k.a. spare bedroom). Notice the TV where I can watch my "stories" as I mindlessly pick poop, vegetation and bib hair out of fleeces.

The skirting table is made out of hardware cloth and plastic pipe. I can send the plans along to anyone who wants a copy.

That's Milhouse's fleece on the table there (the naked critter in the previous blog). That is his blanket fiber, which we are entering in this weekend's Willamette Valley Alpaca Fleece Show http://www.sciolambfair.org/alpacashow.htm

It is associated with the Scio Lamb and Wool Festival, which has a sheepdog trial, too. I'll be there with a booth with other fleeces for sale and some yarn.

I am entering El Barto's, Duffman's and Milhouse's fleeces for this year. Since we only had them sheared on 5/6, I've been picking these three fleeces pretty furiously. I should estimate how long it takes me to pick a show fleece someday. Usually, I spend a couple hours on each before I get disgusted and give up.

I've only got three more days (two really) before I have to turn the fleeces in.
back to work.

m

why shearing day is funny

Milhouse before,




and Milhouse after being shorn.

:)

maren

shearing

Oh, my.

Alpacas do look silly when they've been shorn. Milhouse in particular looks ridiculous without his fluff.

It's a good thing their feelings aren't hurt when you laugh at them.

Or maybe they are hurt. They just look so sad when they are naked that it is difficult to tell how they feel.

hee hee hee
maren

Shearing in a week!

We have two shearing dates this year: May 5, and June something. This happened for a couple reasons:

1. Cabernet will be too close to her due-date to shear in June. She is due in August, and has had a history of having trouble in late-term pregnancy. We will be far more comfortable shearing her three months out than two months.

2. There is a fleece show in Scio, OR, the third week of May. I'd like to have the boys' fleeces for the show, but our original shear date wasn't until June. Polly is going to bring her boy over to be shorn for the show as well.

The bad news is that I haven't been working with Duffy on the halter nearly enough. I put one on him for the first time today. He was pretty good about it (Barto was, too, when he was a baby), but I need to work on Milhouse as well, especially since he was such a stinker at the show.

It will be a very interesting shearing because the shearer is going to use a table: This thing swings up vertically, then you strap the alpaca to it, then you flip it horizontal, then you shear them lying down. None of the animals have seen one of these before, I think. It will be weird. :)

m

Heart of the Valley wrap-up

We didn't win any ribbons at the HOTV show.

However, we did have some good times, make a movie, and sell an alpaca. I have to say that it was a successful show!

Some friends of mine (all college professors or librarians) decided to enter a documentary film contest (I'll add the URL to the contest soon). The contest allowed competitions 4 1/2 days to make a 4-8 minute documentary, but they would give us a topic and a "theme" at the beginning of the contest to keep people from starting early. We brainstormed ideas before the contest, and I brought up the alpaca show. My friends love our critters, and we decided that, if we could, we would shoot the documentary at the HOTV show.

The topic turned out to be "sports" (if dog shows are a sport, so are alpaca shows!) and our theme was "freedom" (so we shot pictures of the critters running "free" across the field). The crew shot some footage at our farm the day before the show, took shots of us loading the boys up in the trailer and shots of the show set-up on Friday, and then spent most of Saturday at the show filming and interviewing people. They spent Sunday editing. I was still at the show.

They finished the film and mailed it off on Monday. I have a copy for ETF and one for WABA. I think the film is great. They focused on the fact that alpacas are "flight animals," and so this whole show thing is a little bit of a strain for them, and unnatural. I'll be showing the film at our WABA meeting on Thursday.

The other good news from the show is that we have sold Tony! If you remember, Tony is the replacement alpaca that the previous owners of Cabernet gave us when her baby died last year. Actually, we picked him up at last year's HOTV show! Anyway, the people who have bought him bought another male from another farm, too. They just wanted some pets for their kids. They have some land outside of Corvallis, and four little red-headed children. I think Tony made the sale when he let each of the kids (except the 2 year old) lead him around on a halter. He was so curious about them and gentle. I suspect he is going to be a 4-H project or something someday.

We didn't get as much money as we wanted for Tony, but I agreed to the price on the condition that we get this year's fiber off of him. They were perfectly happy to do that. The yarn we had made from last year's fleece was so nice that I have been looking forward to this year's fleece for a while.

So, it was a good show. Tony's sale just about covered our costs if we don't look at them too closely. Yay!

The Show List

We are preparing for the Heart of the Valley Show which begins on Friday. Just so you all know what's involved, here is my list of to-do's and don't-forgets for the show:

• feed--hay, pellets, water bucket
• grooming--whack-it
• poop--small broom (better on the mats than a rake)
• fiber for fleece show--picked and bagged
• halters and leads
• yarn (if it is back from the mill)--lables, reciepts, display, sacks
• fiber for sale--lables
• folding chairs, snacks, photo/ribbon album, corkboard (for display)
• sheet protectors, information sheets on animals, zipties, banner, cards
• showbooks (I made them this year)
• decorations

We also have to arrange with another alpaca owner to take our alpacas to the show because both of us have final exams to give on Friday. Oh well.

Gotta go!

too much to do

m

new WABA website

Charles and I are members of the Willamette Alpaca Breeders' Association or WABA. For the past six months or so, we have been members of the committed created to re-vamp the WABA website. We launched the new site on February 16. Take a look!

http://www.alpacas-waba.org/

It was a lot of work, but I think the site looks really good. Also, check out the sales pages and herdsire pages. WABA members get to post their animals on these pages for no charge (beyond membership dues). Sweet deal, huh?

m

An Escape!

We have New Zealand fencing (posts with high-tension wires strung between) on our ranch for a couple reasons. First it is quite cheap compared to woven-wire fences and easy to install. Second, it was recommended to us by a large alpaca ranch. It can be electrified and is quite adequate for animals like alpacas which don't challenge fencing. It does come with a couple risks, however.

First, it is not for horses because they can get tangled in the wires, freak out, and do serious damage to themselves.

Second, alpacas can escape.

We have seen this escape three times, but I am convinced all three were accidental, and none of the alpacas involved actually know what happened. This is what I think has happened: The alpacas love to roll in the dirt (or mud, whatever), and in their vigorous rolling, they get their feet, then their heads outside of the fence so that when they stand, they are on the other side! They always seem as surprised as the rest of us when this happens.

Our biggest alpaca, Cabernet, has done this twice, and both times I'm sure it was accidental. The most recent escape was on SuperBowl Sunday, when Charles, my mother and I went outside during a commercial to put the alpacas to bed quickly. Naturally, that was when we discovered Cabernet on the wrong side of the fence, very much wanting to go into the barn to get her treats. We are fortunate that alpacas are very herd-oriented because I have no idea how long Cabernet had been outside the fence before we found her. If she were a horse, she could have been miles away by the time we noticed.

We finally caught her and put her away after only about ten minutes of chasing. Thank goodness we took the time to halter-train her!

We had heard stories about cria accidentally rolling out of New Zealand fencing, so our maternity pasture has 2x4 woven wire fencing. But we never thought a big alpaca could pull the same stunt!

This probably won't be a problem once we get the fence electrified. I suspect it will only take a couple zaps before all the alpacas avoid the fence completely. But take it from me, New Zealand fencing is not secure for alpacas. They can get out, and I wouldn't put it past a smart one to figure out how to do it if it happens to him once or twice.

That's all!
m

We're famous, and we're upgrading

I am featured in this issue of the Mount Holyoke Quarterly with El Barto, our ribbon-winning alpaca! This is the link to the magazine, but the online version does not have the sidebars with the class notes, which is where my part is. http://www.alumnae.mtholyoke.edu/quarterly/current.php

The sidebar feature talks about our little farm and how we became involved in alpacas. I was interviewed last September for this, but the magazine has only just come out. I have to say that I now hate the picture I sent them, but what are you going to do? Anway, I have had two responses since the magazine was mailed yesterday from other Holyokers who have alpacas or are going to get some soon! How fun!

In addition, I am finally upgrading our website so that it looks more professional. Partly this is because there will be more traffic on the site now that we have been featured in a national magaizne, partly because I am done tweaking it. If any of you find mistakes, please let me know a.s.a.p. I think I have checked all of the links, but I may have missed something. Check us out again at http://www.et-farms.com.

ta

maren

Wetness

This is about the 40th day of straight rain here in Western Oregon. This means that the barn and pastures are simply flowing with water. The alpacas seem unaffected except that they spend more time in the barn when the rain is really coming down, and their fleece is simply a mess. The barn is flooded, so cleaning it is a soupy chore. We really really need to put a drain around the barn in the spring or summer to keep this from happening again.

Other than that, we are gearing up for the show coming in March. I am putting together the showbook for the Heart of the Valley Show on March 25 and 26, which happens to be the weekend after finals week this year. At least the show will be over before spring break so we could actually relax a little. We are taking Barto and Milhouse, but we may also bring Duffman, who will just be old enough to compete. I don't have his registration yet, and I can't enter him until I do, so we'll see. He has such gorgeous fleece.

Finally, I am finally putting together a lot of fleeces to be spun by Starcastle mill in Washington. I am picking the last of the fleeces, and I'll throw them into the mail when it is done. I am hoping to have the yarn back before the HOTV show! Wouldn't that be great? I am very very excited. :)

ta
maren

Quarantine is over!

We have spent the last several weeks keeping the girls and the little boys separated from the big boys so that we can treat the recent additions for coccidia. We know that the places where the girls spent the fall had coccidia infections because either other animals were sick or Dawn was sick. On the advice of our vet, we kept a strict quarantine for two weeks (no sniffing, even) and treated for the coccidia for three.

Now everyone is well and we can put them into adjoining pens again. They like to sniff and say hi.

The stall the girls are in is still a soupy mess, but it is better than last winter. Also, they now have two stalls to roam in, so there is a dry spot for everyone to sleep on.

In other news, I am in the process of taking all the entries from 2005 and re-writing them into a book. That is a big enough project to keep me off of the streets for a while. :)

m

The Alpaca Breed Standard

I’m going to give my two cents about the idea of an American Alpaca Breed Standard. I’ve done a little research, and these are the conclusions I’ve come to.

First of all, I’m not sure that we need a breed standard. Breed standards are useful in dog shows because they need to ensure that their animals are pure. ARI registered alpacas in this country are all DNA tested and their parents are registered and have been DNA tested. There is no reason to question the “purity” of registered American alpacas.

Second, if we accept that the ultimate goal of alpaca breeding is to create animals that are conformationally healthy and will produce ample commercially viable fiber. It has been shown that great fiber can come from any phenotype. That is, some very ugly alpacas can produce some very great fiber. What this means is that a breed standard which focuses too much on aesthetics may not contribute to the breeding of great fiber animals.

Third, let’s say that AOBA adopts a breed standard that favors a certain phenotype: for giggles, let’s say that the alpaca standard calls for a long, goat-like beard. Very few alpacas would show this trait, but those that did would instantly increase in value. In addition, everyone would want to breed to these animals in order to get the genes for this beard-trait into his or her own herd. What this means is that, because of the demand for the genes of these rare animals, many animals would be born that would be very closely related to each other. Alpacas have a limited gene pool in the first place compared to say sheep or cattle, and further limited their genes would make them far more susceptible to disease. Cheetahs have been held up as and example of what can happen to species with limited gene pools. With our closed registry, it seems like a very bad idea to further limit our animals’ genetic diversity for purely aesthetic reasons.

Some breed standards that are based on aesthetics are harmful to breeds. Take, for instance, English bulldogs. English bulldogs have been bred to have such big heads that the animals cannot give birth naturally; they must have Caesarian sections. These animals cannot reproduce naturally because of an aesthetic trait that humans appreciate. This is a not-so-extreme example of how aesthetics can overshadow the useful traits of the animals involved.

Part of the fear that small farms have expressed about the breed standard is that large farms who have a “trademark” phenotype will try to get that phenotype written into the breed standard. All joking aside, let’s take the Accoyo head as an example. I must admit, I love the look of the Accoyo head, with the fuzzy cheeks and fluffy topknot. However, this is a phenotype. Don Carlos calls it his “trademark.” The fuzzy cheeks and fluffy topknot are not the sole indicators of an animal with dense, fine fleece. This is an aesthetic characteristic. Period. There are people who breed almost exclusively for this type-y head. But because their animals have fuzzy cheeks does not mean that they have animals with great fleece. If an Accoyo head become part of the breed standard, though, then those animals become more valuable, and other breeders are left out in the cold.

I have identified two pros. First, an alpaca breed standard could make judging at shows more uniform. With a clearly-written standard, animals would be judged based on the standard, not just compared to other animals in the ring. Also, a breed standard could be used as a tool for breeders to evaluate their own animals, or for buyers to evaluate animals they are considering buying.

Second, if we accept the thought that the goal of alpaca breeders is to create animals that have good, healthy conformation and can grow abundant fiber, then we can design an American Alpaca Breed Standard that is reasonable. The Canadian Alpaca Breed Standard is pretty bare-bones, but it is a good start. It simply gives a description of correct confirmation and fleece type. There are no aesthetic attributes.

All in all, I am opposed to any but the most basic of breed standards. We don’t need to define different breeds since we have only two very distinct varieties of animals, I think there is a high probability that aesthetic characteristics will become the focus of the standard, and limiting the already small gene-pool that we have is a dangerous thing. Those are my thoughts. Please see the websites listed below for further information on the Alpaca Breed Standard.


References:

Canadian Breed Standard: http://www.wakefieldalpacas.com/Breed%20Standard/breedingstand.htm
Comparative Analysis of Breed Standards: http://www.alpacas.com/AlpacaLibrary/ComparAnalyssBreedStandard.aspx
Tears of an Alpaca: http://www.gateway-alpacas.com/alpaca-breed-standard.php

Everybody is home!

We brought Dawn, Duffy, and Consuella home on Friday, December 23 from Nortwest Alpacas where they have been for many months for breeding. In addition, NWA "lent" us another baby alpaca! When Steve heard that Duffy would have no one to play with on our farm, he let us take one of their orphans home as a buddy. So now we have a little white male suri named Kapono on our ranch. We call him "Snowball One" to keep with the Simpson's theme. Eventually, we'll either give him back to NWA, or buy him for ourselves. Snowball is small for his size because his mother died when he was three months old, and he missed out on some good milk. He is the same size as our three-month-old Duffy, and he is extra sweet because of his contact with humans.

On Christmas Eve we went to our neighbor Polly's place (Fernhill Ranch Alpacas) to pick up Cabernet, who has been there since October because she was lonely at our ranch without her friends. She seems glad to be home with her girlfriends.

We have quarantined all of the returnees in a stall out of spitting distance from the boys because all of them have come back from farms with known coccidia problems. Even though only Dawn was ill with it at NWA, we are treating all of them on the recommendation of our vet. This is because coccidia establishes itself in the soil and then becomes a recurring problem. We hope by treating them all, we can keep this parasite off of our ranch. At the moment we are treating their water, but once we get some minerals delivered, we'll treat that as well.

One difficulty with our quarantine plan is that the far stall where the girls are is wet. We have had a lot of soaking rain in the past couple weeks, and that stall is the lowest point in the barn. Even though we put gutters up this summer, the stall is still a muddy wet mess. It breaks our hearts to put them in there every night, but we're stuck for another week of quarantine. After that, we can move them into stall #2, which doesn't have the wetness problem. Next year we ARE going to put in a drain around that side of the barn; the gutters are obviously not the solution to this problem.

I hope everyone had a Merry Christmahanakwanza, and a Happy New Year!

maren

Everybody’s Preggers!

I am astonished.

Not only is Consuella pregnant, but she’s been pregnant for 75 days! Yes, that means that she has been pregnant since approximate September 30. She’s acted pregnant because she HAS been pregnant. I do not know how to explain the inconclusive ultrasounds, or the negative progesterone, but the veterinarian saw a 2 1/2 month-old cria when he ultrasounded her on December 12. So, she knew all along, and kept telling us.

So, we will go pick up the three of them (Dawn, Duffy and Consuella) sometime before the first of the year since we are on break. Then we can bring Cabernet home as well.

First, however, we have an appointment with Dr. MacGuire tomorrow to talk about quarantining them once they are back on the farm. Dawn’s bout with coccidia during her stay at NWA makes it necessary for us to keep her separate, but we are going to keep everyone that’s been off the farm separate d for a while. Cabernet is currently on a farm where a young cria seems to be battling coccida , too. Dr. MacGuire will help us make up a solitary confinement plan.

It will be so nice to have the girls back on the farm! I am looking forward to having a full barn again. Plus, we haven’t seen Duffy since he was three weeks old! He is now three months old, nearly the same age as Bart when we brought him home! We’ll have to start working with him on halter training. If he’s nice enough, we’ll take him to Heart of the Valley with the other boys.

Awesome news.

We’re pregnant!

Well, actually, Dawn is confirmed pregnant, and due around 9/13/06. Dawn is Duffy’s (Mr. “Let’s come into the world head first, not feet first”) mother. We’re glad to hear it. She is bred to Pachacuti, one of Mike Safely’s Studmaster studs. His babies win ribbons. More importantly, he shears many pounds of fiber a year, whereas Dawn shears around two pounds. She needs his density to pass on to her crias. She is ready to come home now.

We think Consuella is pregnant as well. She finally settled for Haldane last month (see the previous blog entry). If she is pregnant, we can get her the week after Christmas. If not, we may have to hold her over until spring. I really don’t want to do that, but having babies in November is not such a good idea, first from a weather standpoint, and second from a last-four-weeks-of-the-term standpoint. If we hold her over, though, she will have been open for a year. That’s a huge waste of money (a whole cria could have been made in that time).

If Consuella is pregnant, we’ll probably get the two girls at the same time at the end of December. If she isn’t, then we may get both of them anyway to take them home for the winter.

Keep your fingers crossed.

The other news is that while I was sick for two weeks this month, Charles taught Milhouse how to eat pellets! This means that we no longer have to give him a daily dose of carrot toothpaste, which is what I called the vitamin paste we were giving him. It’s kind of a shame because he was beginning to enjoy the contact (I think). However, he LOVES his pellets now. He’s like a little Hoover. Vrooom. Now we’ll see if the added nutrition straightens his legs out any.

Breeding updates

Hi Everyone--

Well, the good news is that Consuella, who has not bred properly since August, was observed breeding this week (finally)! Her reproductive workup proved normal, so I hope that the male was to blame. She might just be particular about whom she "sleeps" with, so to speak. Anyway, we should know in a week or two whether she is pregnant this time. This means we'll have an October baby, which I don't really want, but it's better than no baby.

Dawn recovered from a bout with a light case of coccidia last month, which seemed to mostly give her gas. She ought to be ready to come home around Thanksgiving. I'm looking forward to having all the girls home, but we won't be seeing Consuella until nearly cruising.

Cabernet is doing fine at Polly's ranch. She'll stay there until Dawn comes home. They aren't the best of friends, but they will do for company for each other. By the first of the year, the whole happy herd will be back!

This experience makes me feverently hope that we get a stud out of one of our boys soon. At the very least, I'm sorely tempted to use local studs next year. I want my critters on my farm. I bought them because I like them, and I like taking care of them.

The boys are fun, though, and can be challenging. For instance, for some reason, Tony has become a bully. Even though we had two food dishes and two buckets of hay, he still had to harass Bart and Milhouse while they tried to eat. We now separate Tony from them at night by putting him in an ajoining stall. Everyone seems happier for it, and the hay buckets aren't overturned in the mornings.

It is now officially cold here, with the temp this morning a chilly 28 degrees. The alpacas love it.

m

Cabernet at camp

Hi!

briefly, Cabernet was unhappy at home in a field by herself. Even though she could see the boys, she would pace unhappily at the fence when they weren't near. When they were near, she would spit at them. We have taken her to Polly's alpaca farm (Fern Hill Farm) to spend some time with lots of alpacas until Dawn and Consuella come home.

Consuella is having trouble getting pregnant. More on that later.

Dawn had a mild case of coccidiae at NWA, and they took her to the vet and treated her. She is apparently bred, and just needs a few weeks for the pregnancy to set. Duffy seems to be in fine form.

I'll go into details later, but I wanted to report that we are again down to three alpacas on the farm. Ah, the drama!
maren

Milhouse's paste

Hi Everyone!

We are going to start giving Milhouse vitamin paste to try to treat his crooked front knees. Because he has never tried to eat pellets, his nutrition is dependent on the hay and forage we've had him on, so we are worried that he has rickets. Because alpacas are native to the Andes mountains, they are designed to get their vitamin D from sunlight through a very thin atmosphere above 10,000 feet. We are at 400 feet. Maybe you can see the problem.

Anyway, the pellets designed by WABA breeders makes up for the sunlight deficiency by adding the vitamins to the feed. This usually works for all those alpacas that actually eat them. I am sure that all of us (Charles, me and Milhouse) will soon be very tired of a daily dose of paste vitamins, so I am devising plans on how to get Milhouse interested in eating them. Mostly I think he is just not interested in competing with the other alpacas for pellets (I think they are sweet because the alpacas will fight tooth and nail for them). One strategy I am considering is to lock him in the middle stall by himself (he will see the other alpacas) and leave him with only a little hay but a lot of pellets overnight. That might do the trick. I hope it is that easy.

Still no word on Consuella's progesterone, but at least Cabernet seems less stressed. We have put her into the antechamber, which used to be the boy's pasture. It is greening up nicely, and she has a little more room to pace around it.

maren

Cabernet is back

We picked up Cabernet in Albany. Richard and Renate of Alpacas of Lone Ranch were driving up to pick up an alpaca of theirs north of here, so we met up and took Cabernet home. It's nice having a girl at the ranch again.

Unfortunately, she is the only girl here, and she isn't very happy. She doesn't like to be in a pasture by herself, but she ignores the young male alpaca when we put him in with her. We can't let her out with the older male alpacas because we think they would harass her to distraction. So, she paces the fenceline and stares off into the distance, I think at the neighbor's dogs (which aren't out most of the day). I will be SO happy when we have a Consuella back for her to be with. I am so concerned about this, though, that I am considering asking another farm to loan us an female alpaca or gelding to put in with her so she won't act so weird. Either that, or I may ask another farm to baby-sit her until we get more of our own girls back.

Consuella has had two negative ultrasounds, but she spits off at teaser males. I have asked for a progesterone test, which should come back this week. If it is postitive, we will bring her home very soon for Cabernet, and give them both Ultrasounds at 90 days, when there might be more to see. If the test is negative, my options are to re-breed her to Canadar, or pick a different stud. I'm mulling that one right now.

Well, off to put the alpacas away!

maren

New Chicken Coop

The farm is still lonely with only the three boys. They are having a good time in Pasture One because, since it's been raining regularly, for a couple weeks now, the grass has begun to grow back.

Now that the boys are on P1, we have taken the chance to re-seed their pastures--the antechamber which will be re-fenced into runs to the new pastures in the spring. They have nibbled everything down so far that there isn't even any poison oak or blackberries left. We have also re-seeded P0, our maternity pasture/chicken run. We know that the chickens will help themselves to the grass seed, but they won't get all of it.

On the topic of chickens, we finally finished the chicken coop! It took us about three weeks of picking away at it to finish, but now we have moved the 1/2 grown hens outside. The roosters don't quite know what to do with them. They are like teenage boys with nine year old girls. We expect some scuffles in the future.

We are still waiting on word about Consuella's pregnancy status. I am a little annoyed that the vet has not performed a progesterone test on her yet, since that seems to be the next logical step if the ultrasounds are inconclusive. She ought to be nearly six weeks pregnant, and if she's not, I want her re-bred NOW. Dawn and Duffy are up there, and I'd like an update on them, too. I now sign my notes to them, "the squeaky wheel."

When you send your animals away to a big farm to be bred, you sometimes have to pester them to get information. Don't be afraid to be a squeaky wheel. It's better to be a bit of an annoyance than to miss out on an situation that needs to be taken care of sooner than later.

That's all for now!
m

Lonely little farm...

We dropped Dawn and her little baby (named "Duffman" by the attendees of my birthday party) at Northwest Alpacas yesterday (10-1). She is to be bred to Pachacuti, and we probably won't see her or Duffy again until after Thanksgiving. Wah!

The only alpacas we have on our ranch currently are the three boys, Barto, Milhouse and Tony. We were concerned about putting Milhouse in with the big boys, be he seems to be doing all right. We put him in with Barto yesterday just so there was less chance that the bigger boys would gang up on him. He and Barto got along pretty well when they were alone. Now Barto and Tony are playing, and poor Milhouse stands by the sideline like a little brother who doesn't get to play. Poor baby.

We have let the boys into Pasture One (P1), where the girls usually are. Now that it is raining (hard) here, their pasture is nothing but mud. Between the dry summer and their overgrazing, that patch of land was nothing but hard packed dirt for the last two months. We'll seed it and P0 while the girls are away. The boys love P1 since it is twice the size of their normal digs, plus, it has actual green stuff in it!

Charles has been working hard prepping what will be Ps 2 and 3. A week ago we had someone come with a dozer and push the burn pile out of the way and scrape the land so that it didn't have weeds and huge chunks of wood on it anymore. When Charles realized that the dirt was suddenly perfect for seeding, he hurried to buy the seed and fashion a "rake" out of a chunk of chain-link fence and a t-post to drag behind his lawn tractor. He finished a full 24 hours before the current deluge of rain came. He's so sexy when he's handy.

That's the quick update from here. We might get one of the girls back as soon as the last weekend of October, but mostly we are going to miss them until November. So sad. Next year I'll be using local studs, that is for sure!