Wow, it's been hectic lately. Since deciding that we should become a 'closed herd', i.e. one where all alpacas are home bred and without contact with any other herd, we have been incredibly busy. Our clients obviously recognise the benefits of dealing with 'closed herd' breeders and enquiries have been coming thick and fast.

We have now sold all our stock of gelded males and we have had a lot of enquiries for the 2011 cria, 6 of which are now reserved for clients, with delivery in a few weeks. We have 4 remaining cria running about from the 2011 crop. They are advertised on AlpacaSeller and, if you're interested, please get in touch quickly as we don't expect them to hang around for long.

 

Alpacas Faith & Dominique become TV stars....

We were approached by Maverick Television to see if we had any alpacas with 'unusual problems' that might be featured in their brand new C4 series Animal Madhouse. As it happens, we did. We had failed to get Faith pregnant and Dominique had a history of lost pregnancies.

 

Both alpacas were examined by one of the series resident vets, Martin Gabbutt, and referred to top alpaca specialist Claire Whitehead at the RCVS. Following her examination, Claire confirmed that Faith had a condition which made it advisable not to breed her, but happily, Dominique was ok.

Faith will stay on the farm as a companion alpaca and Dominique is now pregnant again and doing well. I'm sure neither will allow 'stardom' to go to their heads!

 

The Welsh Assembly Government has a policy to eradicate Bovine TB in Wales.  We are committed to supporting this policy and we maintain vigorous biosecurity on the farm.  After very careful consideration we decided that we should take active steps to protect our herd and, as far as possible, those of our clients.

During 2009 we decided not to show our alpacas until a reliable bTB testing regime had been developed and we were confident that the risk of bTB transmission had been minimised.  We will continue this policy in 2012.  Additionally we decided not to offer any external stud services or agistment in 2012.  We believe these actions demonstrate a responsible approach to bTB and protect our and our client’s alpacas.

 

We sheared our herd in the middle of May again this year, so that the task is completed before the birthing starts in June. We use a brilliant local shearer, who has been looking after our herd for years. He is very gentle with the alpacas and does a great job. Our wonderful fluffy herd suddenly look like alien creatures. Its amazing how many people stop their cars on the roadside to admire the curious sight before them.

 

Back in 2008, after a lifetime in banking, Peter hung up his hat to work full time on the farm. It's surprising how much more you can get done with two people; but as the alpacas don't take up all of our time, we started keeping chickens and building poultry housing. This has become a business in it's own right and we have set up The Cosy Hen Company. Just click on the link if you'd like to find out more about our hen houses or birds for sale.

As part of our herd development plan, we acquired a new herd sire to stand on the farm. He is a solid white peruvian huacaya called Florentino. He is a well conformed and handsome fellow with a dense 21 micron fleece. We have used him across the herd and his cria have been very impressive. We are also using using our home bred stud, Amazing Diogenes, sired by the award winning CME Tulaco Centruion. Di is a stunning solid white male and we have high hopes for him.

For those of you who would love to keep alpacas, but don't have land available, you may be interested in our Access to Alpacas™ initiative. Just click on the link for more details.

Our farm was awarded the status of a Local Wildlife Site, for the quality of its ancient pastures and diversity of grasses. We display our plaque with pride - the alpacas just love the hay.