Photo update...

On second thought, I think I like this photo of Lucas' fleece a lot better than the one below...

First Time Fleece Show Entries

Wow! It was a lot of work but we skirted two fleeces for the 2009 AFCNA Continental Fleece Show coming up in Gettysburg, PA, this weekend. This is very new to us because we have never before entered a fleece show competition. I'm really excited to find out how things turn out.

What is even more exciting is the fact that they will be sending us back a DVD (at no extra cost) showing the fleece judging as well as all of the seminars at this weekend's event. Even though we won't be there in person, we'll still get to see all the seminars. Even better -- or not -- we'll get to watch as the judges look over our fleece entries and make their comments. Good or bad, it will be a learning experience for us. If the comments are bad, we'll know better next time.

PHOTOS: The "golden" fleece in the box above belongs to our now 12-month old suri male, Luxor's Lucas. I'm worried that as a suri fleece I may have let it get too "fluffy" in preparation. His flat lock style was more connected and actually fell off in more of a blanket as I hand sheared him.

In contrast, our 10-month old suri male, HPF Leroy had all individual pencil locks in his fiber. This photo doesn't quite do it justice since the sky was so overcast as I snapped the picture on my back porch. Although the photo makes it look like a mop, it really is beautiful to see in person.

Both entries are different from each other so we'll have to just wait and see how each of them fares in the fleece show. As they say, you can't win if you don't enter. We took a blue ribbon in our first spin off competition...maybe we'll be just as pleasantly surprised in the fleece competition. When we hear the results, you'll be the first to know!

Making hay.

Since my last post, I've been busy studying fecal samples with the new microscope, talking with farm visitors, training for and running a 10k run (last week), and this weekend we baled hay.

Although our cut hay had gotten rained on the other day, it still dried out enough this weekend for us to bale. At one point we had two balers going and finished the day with about 260 more bales up in the hayloft.

We did need the rain and I hope we get some more soon. However, I hope it rains before we cut hay again!

I want to say hi to my new friends Joanne and Phil from North Carolina. They were in town for a family reunion last week and stopped out at the farm with Phil's mom to see the animals and the old family homestead. (Phil's mother's grandfather and family built the farm. My parents bought it way back in the 1960's.) Coincidently, while in town, Joanne signed up for the 10k run and the two of us ended up running together. We were both really pleased with our time of 1:07. Thanks again, Joanne, for keeping me motivated to make it through the whole 10k! Thanks also to Phil, our cheerleader who cheered us along throughout the route. It's funny how a short stop out to visit our animals turned into a last minute running partner for both of us and a nice friendship!

On-farm fecal testing with the new microscope

I may have mentioned that we bought a microscope and fecal testing kit for the farm a few weeks ago. I finally took the time this past week to try it out. Fortunately it wasn't as complicated as I had thought.

The kit contained complete instructions on how to mix up the flotation solution, as well as provided all the necessary utensils (specimen cups, test tubes, cover slips and slides, etc.). The solution is just a mixture of water and sugar, boiled until it turns clear. You can store the flotation solution in the fridge for a few weeks for use as you need it.

According to the instructions, you need to obtain some fresh "beans" from the dung pile (make sure you know which alpaca or llama the beans came from) and put them into a specimen cup. Then add some of the sugar solution and smash the beans completely in the solution. Next, using a strainer, you pour the liquid from the solution into another specimen cup and then transfer the strained solution into a test tube. You'll need to leave a little "bubble" of solution at the top of the test tube before placing a small, thin glass cover slip over the top. After this is done, you wait 6-8 hours to allow any parasite eggs to float to the top of the test tube. (If you have a centrifuge, the process is different and you won't have to wait as long.)

The final step is to remove the cover slip from the test tube and place it onto a glass slide to examine under a microscope. Our kit contained photos to help identify internal parasites that are common to alpacas and llamas. I'm pleased to report that our worming program is working well. The only scare I had was on one slide that had all of these round black "cells" that looked like tiny black inner tubes. It turns out they were only air bubbles!! What a relief! I will now be more careful not to have too much liquid on the cover slip before I put it onto the slide.

My plan now is to practice reading the slides to make sure I know what I'm looking at and work with Rick and Rene' for their opinions as well. This will help us do a better job of parasite control with our animals.

Please note that my description above of the process is just an overview. There are specific measurements for mixing the sugar flotation solution as well as how much solution to add to your fecal samples. Check out www.rollinghillsalpacas.com for info on purchasing a microscope or parasite testing kit for your own farm. It's an excellent investment to ensure that your alpacas stay healthy!