Naked alpacas...and llamas, too!

Everywhere you look at Hidden Pond Farm, there are naked alpacas and llamas! For the last few days, I've seen them laying flat on their sides, sunbathing.

Yesterday, Rick and I switched gears a little and sheared five llamas. Since we were shorthanded for a day, we knew we could just put the llamas in the chute and shear them fairly easily. Some of the llamas get a little feisty when shearing around their legs and necks, and toenail trimming on a couple of them can be nearly impossible. Nevertheless, we had a nice feeling of accomplishment at the end of the day.

Today was no different. Rene' was able to help us shear four (big) alpaca boys and one more llama. This weekend, we can finish up with Java Joe, our 400+ lb llama, and three alpaca boys. The two juvenile alpaca boys will be hand shorn instead of using the clippers so that should be interesting!

Wishing you a safe and happy memorial day weekend from all of us at Hidden Pond Farm!

Four more shorn...

We sheared four more alpacas today -- two suris and two huacayas.

I'll have to take some shots of Frances Bean and post them on the blog. She looks so incredible now that she's shorn! She had so many appaloosa spots under all that fiber she reminded us of an Oreo Blizzard from Dairy Queen!! She's adorable.

Just a short post today. I'm a little worn out... Only 12 more alpacas left to shear and then we'll do the llamas.

Yes, you can sell alpaca fiber!

We just did! I know...a lot of people sell it all the time but this is new to us. It's funny because we've been so busy for the past few years with our day to day chores, jobs, etc that I never took the time to even try to sell fiber. I knew we needed to do it, but that was one more thing on the list. Now that we sold some I've got so many ideas for selling more!

The tough part is skirting the fiber to take out all the short "second cuts" and all the pieces of hay, etc. These are farm animals that like to roll around in the grass and dirt. Before we shear them, we try to get as much vegetable matter out of the fiber as we can but we can't get it all out. The only way to do it is to find a comfortable spot to lay it all out and start picking through it. Over the last several weeks we've worked on skirting some fiber for a friend to buy. Rene' and her kids, Rick and I all worked off and on to get it done. It was definitely a team effort! Thank you Kathy W. (and Abbie) for your purchase!

Well, we are finished shearing all of our alpacas for the season and now have only four female llamas to shear this weekend. I think last year we were still shearing in July so we're way ahead of schedule!

I mentioned last week that we are expecting a cria any day now...well it could be any day or any week now. I'm not going to try to predict it and Misty isn't going to tell us until she's good and ready.

It's shearing season

Every spring we shear our alpacas and llamas. It's amazing how long and thick that fiber grows on them over the winter. By spring, some of them are practically begging to get it shorn off so they can enjoy the cool breezes.

We got started a couple of weeks ago, just shearing our suri male, Moe. He allowed us to shear him standing up in a chute. We didn't want to risk tying him onto the shearing table since he had broken his leg last November. It should be well-healed by now, but the thought of tying that leg down made us nervous.

Two weekends ago Sunday, we sheared five males. Rick, Rene' and I were worn out by the end of the day but we had a really good feeling of accomplishment. All of our alpaca males in outside pastures were shorn, their toenails clipped, vaccinations and worming completed. They were all in good shape and looking pretty cool with their new haircuts. I was a bit bruised and a little battered....some of them like to put up a struggle getting onto the shearing table. This picture shows our shearing table and Rick and Rene' working together with our mom (you can see her hands on the far left) to shear one of the alpacas. They stay pretty calm on the table so it's very easy to work on them that way.

Last weekend, Rick and I sheared our three llama males. The shearing wasn't so bad as long as they stood still. These guys are way too big to use a shearing table so we put them in the chute and shear them standing up. Our biggest guy is Java Joe and he weighed in a 432 pounds! He doesn't like getting his toenails trimmed at all! I'll have to post a picture of him...I can't find one at the moment but I know I've taken pictures of him.

This weekend we'll start shearing the girls...there's about 7 alpacas and 4 more llamas to go and we'll be finished with shearing for the year.