All clear on the western front.

Autumn Gold in the morning light.
Is that a camel through the eye of a needle?
All together now - munch.
Bramley in the morning light.


With the bright crisp start to the day, it was good to start with the camera, which usually comes out in the evening when the light is fading and the sun at the opposite side of the field. So as I'd cleaned the field and we'd vaccinated and pedicured the girls yesterday, I indulged myself with an hour or so with the camera. It was so clear that shots from the near-by clay pigeon shoot echoed around the hills - with scarcely a breeze, the silence was staggering, a day to just soak in...and then get on with important things... like organizing the new Olympic event: the Individual Faecal Sample Collecting Persuit - where you sprint, keeping a sharp eye on the deposited sample in the grass so that you can sample for parasites and know how each animal is doing...

Toilet training?

Now it's not really for me to query ladies' bathroom habits, however, we only have just over an acre, and my girls have created seven latrines. The biggest problem with that, is that they appear to be growing in size, and we have to maximise the quality (to minimise parasites) and quantity (to cope with drought periods) of available grazing. They have been depositing around the edges of some latrines, hence they've got larger, so this weekend I took advantage of the weather, and after clearing them, I mowed them (by hand mower!) and cleared all the clippings for maximum hygene. Hopefully, they will feel able to go back to the middle, and contaminate a smaller area - time will tell...

I feel we are at the stage of herd development, where a poover and sit/ride mower are becoming necessities. The irony is, that the catalyst for starting a herd of alpacas was the suggestion by one of our sons and daughter, that I buy a sit and ride mower to cut the grass in the field so they could use a mountain board! Meantime, we've been hooked by the wonderful world of alpacas, who now require pastures of the quality that a mower will help improve - and I wouldn't have it any other way.

Scan-scratch-scraps...

Enjoying a treat of Alfalfa.



We transplanted some Lleylandii that were in pots when we moved here, intending to let them grow into a supply of firewood. The alpacas love to have a good scratch on them.




Colin Ottery came on friday to scan Minnie, and with his Top Gun / Back to the Future glasses and scanner confirmed a pregnancy - hooray.

Bramley got ear-tagged and micro-chipped, a health check for insurance and weighed-in at 18kg, now 6 weeks old. Her she is, trying the tree scratch-post:








Sunday morning was pouring, and blowing a 'hooley', I went to the shelter to find all six alpacas keeping out of the rain, and in the corner trying to go un-noticed, were twelve chickens huddled together!

We took all the fleece scraps from shearing with two other breeders this year, and put them into bin bags for insulating the roof of the house - we have an old cottage, with part sloped ceilings (skeilings) which had no insulation - so I spent a horrendous 2 hours lying on my side in the tiny attic space stuffing the fleece into the gaps - pot-holing is much more enjoyable, but doesn't keep the house warm...

It's the time of year for catching up with admin', so I've been sorting out invoices and registered Bramley with the BAS. I'm wondering which software other breeders find suits their herd management?

Now, I wonder if Mum has got my milk ready for bed.....................................

Frivolous photo's

Bramley is 4 weeks old today, 15kg, and as you can see, full of beans.
She is quite inquisitive, and enjoys nibbling a bit of denim, so I tried a bit of 'under-arm' photography!
After the little burst of grass growth in August, we've not had much rain for several weeks, the grass growth has ground to a halt, so tonight I let them into a paddock I had been resting.
Bramley tested this out as a racetrack, and found she could hit top speed even though it is quite small.

8-legged cria?

Here's a few pics to show Bramleys first two weeks...
She's been gaining weight steadily, around 300g a day, mind you, weighing is a proper wrestling match!
Last year, the balance we'd bought was faulty, so I held the cria and stood on bathroom scales - quite straight-forward! However, this year we've got a new digital balance and sling, but getting her in and out of the sling is like wrestling an octopus!
This weekend, I've tidied the paddocks of all Nettles and Docks, topped the latrines, and taken faecal samples from each girl for parasite testing by Mrs. Smallholder - two weeks ago, I re-seeded some bare patches, including half the rolling pit which was getting bigger and bigger as rain washed the soil down the slope, and this weekend the new grass has appeared in spite of the chickens best efforts to eat the seed (I had to fence off with hurdles, and then found the chickens squeezing underneath, and so had to lay some hurdles flat over the seeded area to keep them off!)

What a birthday present!

Pelachuta's eleven month date was today, my, and my daughters birthday, and seeing a good weather forecast for today ahead of heavy rain tomorrow, I went to work wondering whether she would know that, and take action - she was humming frequently and at ten to twelve a shower had sent them all into the shelter, so Mrs. Smallholder decided nothing would happen for a while, and went off to see to do some work - wrong, ten minutes later, there was a cria sitting up on the ground!
I work five minutes away, so I was home in time to see the first staggering steps of another female for us, Bramley, who we later weighed-in at 7.2kg - she seems to be a beautiful colour of dark fawn or light brown, though I'll reserve final judgement for more experienced eyes later. Her sire was CME Centurion, a dark fawn.


She suckled after a couple of hours, while I held my breath each time she went under, until she came out licking her lips, with the unmistakeable drips of milk on them. Having said that it was a fine day, it was blowing a good'un, but the sun was warming - we've put a coat on now, as rain is due to arrive early in the morning.




When she first stood, she was like a tall, leggy fighting machine from the War of the Worlds, and now she totters around like a drag queen in over-ambitious stilletto's!

It's time for a birthday drink with a mate of mine, Jack Daniels - we're going to share a glass of Coke...

Puriton Party in the Park

Yesterday we took our yearling females to a local show that we had been invited to, at a village we left seven years ago. The weather was over-cast but dry and very warm, so, ideal.

Mrs. Smallholder put together a fine collection of alpaca fleece products, and made some good sales. There was non-stop attention from visitors which kept both of us constantly busy, with prospects of on-going interest in various forms from several customers, and we met many friends we hadn't seen for several years.



Comments from some of the visitors reminded me of those characteristics in alpacas that first attracted me, which sometimes you take for granted in dealing with the nitty gritty day-to-day management.

We kept our timing there prompt, so that the alpacas didn't get too uncomfortable -after all, they spent the afternoon being touched, having straw poked at them by tiny hands belonging to toddlers holding inflatable hammers, and watching kiddies launched into the sky on a bungee off a trampoline, while listening to the North Devon Pipe Band! We provided a bacteriacidel handwash for anyone who handled the alpacas, and it proved popular.

Today the sun broke out and I treated them to a clean trough of water, but first gave them a hosing down - you wouldn't have thought five alpacas could get so close to each other without a major tiff and much spitting, but they put all territorial matters aside to share a shower!