Any Alpaca gurus here??

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Started on shearing today. Nails done and legs + tails of the girls.
Cream girl's nails didn't really need any work. But her hair was hard to slide the blade in to cut.
Brown girl's nails were a bit long, but not bad. Very easy to cut her hair, so I was able to get fairly uniformly cut fiber from her. She also has a little longer fiber than the other.
Going to do necks, heads and bellies next time. Thinking of leaving the sides and top of their barrels to get longer fiber next year. It's not much at all, 2-3in.

 

[Bruce]

They look the opposite of mine when I did them last spring. I didn't do legs at all. They were plenty annoyed (especially Laddie) as it was. But they had 2 years of growth, they were pretty miserable hot the summer before. Doesn't seem like there is much on their bellies anyway.

Looks like you've got a bit of green there, my boys are actively trying to find some. They'll have better luck in a couple of weeks.

 

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Removed vm & second cuts from the fiber I got off them, then measured them again for kicks.
Brown- 13.8 to 12.8oz. 1oz of junk.
Cream- 10.7 to 9.4 oz. 1.3oz of junk.
Brown has some super fine fiber.

Cream is washed and drying. Brown is washing now.

 

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Both drying now.

 

[Bruce]

Those are some pretty fine animals if you are getting 2nds, not 3rds, off the legs.

 

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Above knee is nice.
Idk what to do with it. So slippery, can't really do anything with it. =/

 

[Bruce]

Blend it in with some wool??

 

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Blend it in with some wool??

Will try that. Not sure how to do it or how much to add, but we'll see how badly I screw this up soon enough. Lol

 

[Bruce]

You'll do fine. Maybe some web research as to percentage.

 

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Ended up fully shearing one girl. Both girls are for sale, so decided it best they be nakie. It's a back killer, so won't do the other girl today, maybe tomorrow or the next day. Saturday is sheep shearing day!