Happy Thanksgiving!

Well, Moe just couldn't leave things alone. Yesterday he squirmed his way under the fence into the pasture with Iggy and Rico. Everything was fine in the beginning...he even had dinner in there because Rene' thought we had purposely put him in that pasture. A while later, everything got a little crazy and Moe had to be pulled out of there.

Normally, we would let the boys work things out but with Moe's leg injury last year we didn't want to take any chances. He is now in the barn in his own stall to keep him out of trouble. As of this morning, his former roommate Nuno is sharing the pasture with Iggy and Rico. They seem to be getting along fine.

We've got a lot to be thankful for this year - healthy families, healthy animals. I couldn't ask for anything more. Happy Thanksgiving everybody! Enjoy your day.

Success with the crias and trouble with Moe the escape artist!

Lucas has been eating more pellets this week and I saw him drinking water yesterday afternoon! It was cute - he stuck his tongue in the water a couple of times to try it out and after a couple of dips, he lowered his mouth and took a long drink for nearly a full minute. YAY! I was so worried that he would get dehydrated if we didn't keep letting him back in with his mother. Now we can keep them all separated without worrying.

Actually, we can switch our worries in another direction. Our 2-year old male, Moe, has become an escape artist since Friday afternoon. (That's Moe in the photo with Nuno behind him.) We were thinking that he must have found a spot to jump over but we'd never see him do it. After escaping the second time today, I noticed the fence was pushed out in one corner near the ground. There's a low spot on the ground and he must have been crawling under the welded wire fencing! We reinforced the fence with an extra section of goat fencing, plus we placed a couple of cement blocks in the low spot. That must have been the spot for sure because Moe was rather agitated after we patched it up. We're hoping he behaves otherwise we may have to pen him up in the barn.

It was about one year ago that Moe had gotten his rear left leg broken when we moved him into a pasture with several older boys and two others his same age. Luckily, the fractured bones hadn't broken through the skin so the Vet School in Madison was able to perform a successful surgery on Moe. He spent one or two months in Madison before we were able to bring him home and then he was confined to a 12 x 12 stall until we finally felt comfortable enough to set him up in his own pasture with Nuno in late summer. Apparently Moe's leg is much stronger so he's able to crawl under fences on his belly. That's a good sign that we will be able to use him for breeding next spring. We would have liked to use him this fall but we wanted to give him enough time to build up the bone around the repaired area. I hope he behaves and stays in his pasture so we don't have to pen him up again.

Since I'm already talking about Moe's leg, let me take a moment to do a commercial for the veterinarians who fixed him up. I can never say enough good things about our experience with the Vet School in Madison! Every chance I get, I tell everyone what wonderful care Moe received. They saved his life and he actually enjoyed his follow-up visits to Madison. They updated us every day while he was in their care so we never had to worry about how he was doing. If you are ever in a situation where you would need them, I know first hand that your alpacas will be given the best care possible and you will be well-informed about what's going on with their care.

Well, that's all for tonight. Happy Thanksgiving!

Weaning the crias

It wasn't easy getting a picture of these three because somebody was always facing the wrong way or had their face buried in the feed dish. I finally got this picture of Franny (brown & white huacaya), Lucas (center) and little Leroy this afternoon.

We've had a little trouble getting Lucas to eat and drink on his own. I noticed earlier this week, after just about two days separated from their moms, that Lucas was straining over the poop pile. I hadn't seen him drinking on his own so we gave him a bottle of supplement like we've been feeding Leroy. He wasn't too keen on drinking it but we made sure we got the full bottle into him so that he wouldn't get dehydrated. The following morning, to be on the safe side, we let Lucas and the other two crias back in the pen with their moms. Lucas nursed like there was no tomorrow.

Now we've got them on a schedule where we pen them up in the evening at feeding time and let them back out with their moms in the morning. Franny and Leroy dig right in to the sweet multifeed, but Lucas is still not as interested. I've noticed Lucas eating more of the feed this weekend though. I'm hoping he is starting to drink water on his own too. I've made sure he's aware of the water by letting him dip his mouth in the bucket and wetting my fingers and getting a little water in his mouth. We'll still have to keep a close watch on him for a while I guess.

In seven years of raising alpacas, I don't remember ever having this much trouble weaning any of our crias. Fortunately, Lucas is the only one we've ever had to worry about. I can see he's catching on but I don't want to rush him if he isn't ready. For now we'll continue to give him time with his mom during the day until we can see he's able to drink enough water on his own as well as eat pellets.

Oddly enough, as small and young as Leroy is, he's been eating and drinking to his heart's delight - that little guy is definitely a fighter! Since Leroy's eating regular feed now, we're cutting down his bottles to only four per day. He's well over 30 pounds and doing great. Maybe he can teach Lucas to become less dependent on his mom...

Winter is coming...

We just started seeing some very light snow flurries here this weekend but luckily it's still too warm for the snow to stick. The wind today felt bitter cold though and I had to pull out the long johns for the first time this fall! I'm not looking forward to the cold winter ahead.

The time was right for us to pen up our crias away from their moms for weaning. Of course it doesn't make a difference with Leroy because he is still being bottle fed. Franny seems to be handling the separation okay, but Lucas wasn't very happy with it at all. Lucas was humming and trying to find a way out of the pen to get back to his mother. After a couple of hours though, it seemed that all three crias were calmed down and nibbling on hay in their stall. They are set up right next to their moms stall so they are still able to peek their heads through to talk to each other.

We'll have to keep a close eye on Lucas in particular to make sure he is getting enough to eat. Franny has been eating pellets and sweet multifeed for a few weeks now, but Lucas never really seems to be interested in it. I put a few bits of sweet feed in his mouth, one at a time, and he spit them out, one at a time...by the fourth piece though he seemed to realize that it didn't taste too bad. I saw him at the feeder for a little while but I'm not sure how much he ate. He finally relaxed in his new stall and was snacking on hay when I last checked on him. I'm sure he'll be fine but we have to keep an eye on him to make sure he's eating enough now that he can't rely on his mom for meals.

I've also noticed that Franny has a tendency to choke when she eats so I put some grassy hay in the feeder so she'll have to forage through it for the grain. This seems to help whenever we have a problem with an alpaca that chokes. I guess it slows them down so they can't eat as fast. When they eat really fast the saliva combined with the pellets causes the pellets to expand in their throat and they have trouble swallowing it. That's when they start to drool and choke.

Rick and I have different techniques to fix it and I basically try everything I can to help out the choking alpaca. One way that seems to work for Rick is to vigorously rub their neck in long strokes, up and down. Most times I try to pat up and down the neck to loosen things up in there. I'm sure everyone has their own method that works. The alpaca will usually start coughing up green slime from the loosened up feed and after they get some of it out they are fine. Just keep an eye on them and make sure they are acting normal and starting to eat again or nibble on hay.

I'll try to post some pictures this week of our three new roommates Franny, Lucas and Leroy.

Where have I been?

I didn't realize it's been a couple of weeks since the last time I wrote. Time really flies. My back went out right around the time of my last post, then I had some additional health issues to take care of. Now my back is fine and everything is looking much better.

Last weekend we microchipped our three crias. Alpaca farms participate in the livestock ID program by microchipping or eartagging their animals. We use Riley ID and have a scanner to read the chips. The chips come in a sealed package and are inside a very large "needle". We use a special injector that pushes the microchip out of the needle after we poke the needle under the skin. Click on this link to see instructions from Riley ID on how to inject the microchips: http://www.rileyid.com/directions/injecting.htm.

It looks like it might really hurt, but after we're finished our alpacas are fine. They might be upset with us at first, but they get over it in time. Fortunately, we've never had any complications or problems while microchipping our alpacas. As a matter of fact, there most often isn't any bleeding from the process either. It looks lot worse than it is.

I received an update from the AAFF regarding the alpaca fiber they've purchased from member farms. In their latest message they said, "December 3 & 4, 2008 will make history for the alpaca world. That is the date of the Denim by Première Vision, show http://www.denimbypremierevision.com/." The show is in Paris, France, and it's dedicated to denim. AAFF will be promoting their American alpaca denim fabric. Let's hope they have great success at the show so the demand for alpaca fiber increases in the U.S.

Hey, tomorrow is Election Day - don't forget to exercise your right to vote!