Any Alpaca gurus here??

[Sara Ranch]

Congrats!!!

I have seen alpacas kept in with just 4' woven wire fence. No hot wire.

I have seen alpacas in with goats and LGD. No problem. They eat and sleep with the others.

Not sure what the cause of death was for 2 of them. The owner suspected that the two alpacas ate something poisonous (plant) in their environment. The third one is still alive.

They "spit" and they "give wet slobbery kisses with tongue." I have been told this, so it absolutely MUST be true! I have never had one spit at me. And I have shied away from the mouth to mouth contact with an alpaca.

 

[Bruce]

They look to be integrating well @secuono How are the dogs doing now?

They DO spit @Sara Ranch but in case you don't know, it is NOT saliva. They spit from their first stomach, pretty stinky. Teddy isn't a spitter but Laddie is. He generally saves it for Teddy when he's being annoying. Mostly that means leaning his neck over Laddie's neck and pressing down, I've never seen them kick at each other. But he was spitting the FEW times we handled him. Fortunately his aim was at the wall he was facing. We were careful to have a towel handy to put over his head so he couldn't aim at us later.

I have NO idea about wet slobbery kisses. Mine aren't friendly. But they aren't slobbery when they eat pellets from my hand. They "nibble" it out with their lips.

 

[secuono]

Dogs are a lot more calm, they are hyper & squiggly when greeting new additions & the alpaca don't like that kind of stuff, so either someone's going to get kicked for being too nosey or I'll manage to keep them calm some magical way, lol.

Puppy tries to lick n sniff them through the fence, but they don't wanna get that close.

My older gelding will be fine to introduce off lead, as he doesn't do games. But the other horses will have to be on a lead, since they wanna prance around acting like fools. Baby gelding tried to chew on one through the gate, then raced off.

They should do great with the sheep.

Gelding alpaca likes to come by close to me, girls are still too chicken unless I have food.

 

[Baymule]

Congrats on the alpacas! I know you have done some things with your sheep's wool, now you'll have alpaca wool to play with! Are you going to get a spinning wheel?

 

[secuono]

Congrats on the alpacas! I know you have done some things with your sheep's wool, now you'll have alpaca wool to play with! Are you going to get a spinning wheel?

Have a wheel, it only frustrates me.

 

[Bruce]

Wait til you try to spin alpaca, I read that it is a lot harder than wool. But it is common to spin a bit of something else into the alpaca ... like WOOL!

 

[secuono]

Most likely will sell all or most of their fiber. Have enough work dealing with wool.

 

[Baymule]

There was a fiber festival in our small town a few weeks ago. We went, it was very informative. It was booths with alpaca and sheep wool, yarn, roving, finished products, a fiber mill, people were spinning, carding, one lady was hooking a rug. It almost made me want wool sheep!

 

[secuono]

 

[secuono]

Bought some funky sheep halters where under jaw and behind head are adjustable.
Made a catch pen and lured them in.

As I was putting a halter on, grumpy female, cream, spit on the others and then the dog. Oh no, not the dog!! Mr LGD bout had a bull!! I will have to keep him out of any pasture the alpaca are in, he reacted far too violently to being spat on! The other two LGD backed away, unlike him, who let his confusion lead him to poke n prod at them and bark at them. That led to freaked out pacas and me deathglaring him down and threatening to make a coat out of him!

Anywho, was able to put on a halter on each one w/o getting spat on or kicked at, so that's good.

I need to melt a couple holes in the head strap so the halters fit better. Won't be perfect, but will work for the rare times I may need them.

They came back to me afterwards, hoping I had more food, so it doesn't seem like they hate me.

Have a red, dark purple and a dark blue. Only ones they had in stock.

Mr paca

Cute paca

Grouchy paca
She was spitting and biting the others for touching her.

The catch pen. Just a cattle panel attached to gate and a 4ft panel attached at the other end of the gate. Food at the wood post, the go in, I slowly close the long panel. Can clip it at the end of the 4ft gate if they freak or slowly keep closing until it's right at the start of the 4ft panel. Enough room for me to walk between them.