30/07/2009 by Rosemary.

After a lovely sunny morning the rain hammered down again.  I got caught over in the field as I was giving Little Star her bottle and we all; me, Little Star and all the mums and cria charged down the hill into the barn.  Yoda is very curious now about Little Star’s bottle.  When she runs up he follows and stares, wondering what is going on!  We weighed her tonight, we hadn’t yesterday because the rain was so bad and I didn’t want to disturb them from the barn.  I was amazed, she is now 8.4kg!  That is a gain of 0.8kg in 2 days.  Lamblac seems to really work well.

In between the rain, Sam and I managed waste which is so much easier with the Provac.  The only problem was Sam treats me like a slow learner and keeps explaining everything and stopping me to re-explain!  He and Carl are now out there continuing with Cool Dude’s new paddock - he’s going to have a lovely view.  I walked the fields checking for ragwort but got a bit distracted in third watching the shadows moving across the hill across the valley.  It still amazes me that just over two years ago it would have taken me 5 minutes to check the fences round my little plot and now it takes an hour round the fields - we’re very lucky.

Sorting out our products from the fleece is moving slowly.  Carl’s mum sent me a trial of a possible little baby bonnet (thank you, Pat!) - it is wonderfully soft.   I’m trying to make sure everything is exactly right before the final range goes into production.

I have now sent Sam off to fill a pillow case with alpaca poo - not to sleep on I hasten to add!  I am going to put it in the water butt I use to water the plants. The goodness should then seep out into the water, cheaper than plant food.  Just must remember not to use that butt for the chickens!

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29/07/2009 by Rosemary.

Hello it’s me again, Sam.

Mum thinks that I should write the blog every now and then. Well today has been very wet, it has been raining ALL day. Mum had to take grandad to the hospital so that meant I was left to feed the baby (Little Star, we think that will be its name but I am not sure).  I have spent most of the day sitting in the barn, other than that I (tried to) tidy my bedroom.

So overall it was not an exciting day.  I have tried to make a small wall in the barn so that the alpacas could sit and eat their hay (that mum and dad told me NOT to waste because we don’t have much, sorry Mark) without getting wet. BUT the 5 babies (not including Little Star) had other ideas of what they were going to do in the hay, they just wanted to roll and kick all the alpacas that were trying to eat.

Also today mum cooked what she called lovely but me and dad didn’t.  It included rice, sausage and bacon. (but don’t try this at home).

Have you seen the page about Cool Dude on the website yet?  www.westhillalpacas.co.uk

I am trying to get mum to get me my own blog page!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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28/07/2009 by Rosemary.

I have spent many frustrating hours today, in between everything else, attempting to set up a special extra blog for Cool Dude.  I like writing my blog and I even read it sometimes, quite sad really!  But I don’t want those who do read it to get tired of hearing about the new love of my life, Cool Dude!  If I start going too much into pedigrees and show results some may get bored; so my solution was to have two blogs - one dedicated to Cool Dude.  Sounded easy to me as I was bottle feeding in the rain at 4 in the morning!  It isn’t!  The temporary solution is that I have inserted an extra page on the website called Cool Dude’s Progress which I will update each week.  If you want to see it you can find it at www.westhillalpacas.co.uk (but you might not find the new bits uploaded until tomorrow as it seems to function at the speed of a striking slug!).  One day it will turn into a blog but I gave up today.

Little Star is now 7.6kg which is great.  I rushed to the local agricultural merchants this morning, as we were nearly out of Lamblac, and caused a commotion.  I said to the young lad at the counter, “Have you got any Lamblac?”  He said,  “What size would you like?”  I said, “Have you got a small?”  He said, “Oh yes, I’ve got a small one!”  To the amusement of the entire store and our embarrassment!  After that excitement I settled to a day of waste management, feeding and internet frustration!

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27/07/2009 by Rosemary.

I cannot hold the secret to myself any longer!   Lots of people guessed but no-one guessed right.  Action man phoned at 7am with his guess,  strangely he appeared to be in the middle of a hay fight!  We are in a daze at the moment.  The big news is - We are now the very, very proud owners of Wellground Cool Dude a gorgeous solid white yearling, brother to  supreme champion Wellground Legend of Spartacus and with a mother who has the famous Commisario as her dad, EP Cambridge Giselle.

Photo coming up now, sent to us by Rob, and taken this morning after a horrible wet start to the day.

Just look at that face!

We feel so proud of him already, Carl is out there right now - despite the light fading fast, continuing to build the new alpaca pen especially for him.  His new best mate will be Dobby, the black wether, and Carl is creating a sign for the gate.  The current thinking is that it will read “Home of Wellground Cool Dude and Dobby”.  Cool Dude isn’t with us yet but more about him and his fleece when he arrives. Got to go and feed Little Star!

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26/07/2009 by Rosemary.

It has been an incredibly busy few days and I have still got two pages of urgent jobs.  Last night we were in fits of hysterical laughter over a card sent by our friend in the village - a cartoon of me on the quad - hair flying, grinning manically, shouting “Have you ‘been’?”  While two alpacas stand at the side saying, “Go away!  You’re putting us off!”  Very true to life!

Everything seems to be happening at once and what was supposed to be a peaceful morning recuperating turned into a mad panic when Carl and Sam went down the road and came across a horse right in the middle, fully tacked but with broken reins and a car looming round the corner!  They took it to the side of the road and grabbed a passing motorist to hold it while they charged around looking for the rider.  As they were thinking of ringing for the police they came across her - she was fine but had fallen off over the gate leading down from the ridge and the horse had got away.

After that drama Carl started on the new alpaca paddock.  He spent an hour digging out a hole for one of the corner posts only to realise that it was in the wrong place and had to start again.  I had to do some urgent paperwork and feed every 2 hours.  The feeding is paying off though.  Little Star is now 7.4kg, so she has gained 1.4kg in 3 days.  She still tries to feed from her mum and Bert loves that!  Bert is so relaxed now.  When I feed she just stands or lies at the side and when it has finished she follows it and sniffs it and takes it off.

I am trying desperately not to write about the other exciting thing that has happened but I can’t until I have permission but I just have to give you a clue!  You might be able to work it out from the Wellground Alpaca Stud website - link at the side of the page!

Photos of the cria coming soon but now I must go and feed Little Star!

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25/07/2009 by Rosemary.

It has been a brilliant day!

The sun has been shining and Little Star has been drinking her bottles and charging around the field.  She runs over when she sees the bottle coming, if it is feed time, but at any other time she keeps at arms length and sticks with Bert - which is really good.  Sam was on feeding duty this morning and did it really conscientiously.  I still did a 2am feed last night and I was glad I did because she was really thirsty and drank everything in the bottle.  We still have to weigh her but she is very lively so it looks good.

Sam was in charge this morning as we went on a visit to Wellground Alpaca Stud.  I know I have said it before on the blog but Rob and Lesley really are lovely people and very knowledgeable.  We were there just to view but they were so helpful and stood there patiently while we viewed the fleece of animal after animal.  I saw stunning  cria and was able to develop my judgement on fleece qualities which is fantastically useful.  I don’t think you can get far until you have examined fine animals closely.  Both Buckingham and Samson produce gorgeous cria and we have high hopes for next year.  We have come back bursting with ideas and hugely excited about breeding plans.  I was going to say we won’t sleep tonight we are so overexcited, but then we won’t anyway as we will be on cria feed and watch!

Pat and Dave brought lunch over and a magnificent arch Dave has created to train the honeysuckle over.  The workmanship is superb and I feel it is really rather too good for the garden - we were admiring it this evening and felt we should erect a plaque on it - “Made by Dave.”   W e sent them away with homework projects - knitting for Pat and woodwork for Dave - no rest for Westhill visitors!

It has also been a brilliant day because it was my birthday!  I actually think birthdays get better as you get older - I had lots of cards and presents and I didn’t feel ancient.  Sam gave me a beautiful tin of jelly babies and a book on household management (I think he may be hinting about the lack of cleanliness and organisation in the house at the moment!

Excitement about life is now overwhelming me so I am just going to sit with the alpacas!  Just a shame Mum and Dad couldn’t get up here - soon though!

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24/07/2009 by Rosemary.

A quick one tonight as I am really tired!  Bert’s baby is now named Little Star - thank you Rob for the email which inspired the name!  Little Star is doing well.  She was 6kg last night, up from 5.4kg the day before!  We have to fiddle around with the bottle a bit to get her going but then she sucks like mad.  Sam uses his finger technique and I wipe the bottle teat every time she stops and then she seems to take it again.

We are going to visit Wellground Alpaca Stud tomorrow morning - not for long with Rob not 100% and Little Star to look after, it is very good of him to have us at all.  I am longing to see his cria, Sam can’t go as he is in charge of feeding.  He is on Alpaca seller every night at the moment as he has an ambition to breed his own solid black suri!  I have told him he will have to start at the bottom and breed his way up so he is trying to get his head round pedigrees and breeding plans!  I have also told him he will have to start saving!

Carl slept at home last night as he was getting silly due to lack of sleep.  He was in the caravan reading the adverts in Blackmore Vale magazine, a local free paper, and kept going on about Sarah wanting a big cob.  I had no idea what he meant and sent him away for the night.

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23/07/2009 by Rosemary.

She might not weigh much, but Bert’s baby is a little fighter!  At 4 this morning she suddenly got the hang of the bottle, latched on and sucked away like crazy!  The morning feeding was a bit more hit and miss but then Sam took over for the afternoon as we had a visit to make and he invented a strange feeding system where you hold the bottle so a finger is sticking out and the cria sucks the finger and the bottle alternately!  It seemed to work as a lot went down.  Sam can now take his turn with day feeds.  Bert is still very loving with it and stands there with a dreamy look on her face whilst it sniffs around for milk - nothing there though.  But I am still puzzling over the colour and the fleece.  It is totally different from anything we have had before.  Very dense and curly - odd!  Me and Sam in the caravan tonight -Carl is getting a good sleep!  Bert will need remating before long so it’ll be a visit from Wellground soon.

More photos tomorrow.

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22/07/2009 by Rosemary.

Thank you Sam for holding the fort (and kicking me in the head in the night, and leaving your disgusting socks under my pillow but at least you don’t snore like your father - it’s not easy for three in a two berth caravan!).  It is odd but the Blog gets really important in times of crisis!  It is nice to know people are interested in our animals and we love getting the comments.  Sam now thinks he should write an entry once a week and I agree!

Back to Bert’s baby, no name yet as I am a bit scared to start naming it yet!  She had it when we were not in the field and the rain was hammering down.  It was between 1 and 2 hours old - maybe a little more and it was wringing wet and caked in mud.  Bert and her were both shivering like leaves.  We got them in the barn and dried the cria as much as we could but the mud made it very difficult.  Bert was very protective and bit Carl’s ear at one point.  It was a very pathetic sight as the cria was desperate to drink and Bert was trying so hard to get it to feed from her but there was nothing.  We defrosted some colostrum but it was very difficult to get it down her.  This was not helped by me forgetting to snip the end of the teat!  In the end we used some powdered colostrum made up very thick and shot it down her throat in a syringe.  That perked her up a bit and she then had some from the bottle but she kept trying to get it from her Mum.  We kept going with a bottle every two hours all night, we had to pen all the animals in the barn with a separate little bit for Bert and the cria but Caroline lay right across the entrance gate and would not move so Carl and I had to keep climbing over pallets we had used to make the pen to get to her and that was an art in itself.  If only I had a proper barn!  The cria shivered all night despite the coat - oh for a heat lamp!  The rain drove in at the sides and it was still hammering down in the morning.  By 5am we were getting a bit fatalistic then she suddenly went for the bottle - that was Carl’s doing.  WELL DONE CARL!  He is very proud of himself, like a new Dad.  I expect him to slope off to the pub for a cigar and a pint, “Just to wet the babies head”!

We then went on to lamb milk replacer but by now all the girls were getting restless and wanted to go back to the field.  Horrible weather though and I didn’t want the cria getting wet again.  Bert went frantic every time they looked like they were about to go out of sight.  The first break in the rain this morning I let them all out into the field and they all charged about for a few minutes with Bert chasing after her cria.  This morning feeding was still painfully slow.  We cleaned up the barn and a bit of grass outside and prayed for the sun.

Our prayers were answered!  The sun came out!  The cria isn’t easy to feed and does not take much at a time but she is following the others around and sticking close to her mother.  We took her coat off but that was a real performance!  Bert screeched at me as if I was killing it.  I read another breeder saying the same thing had happened with her - maybe Bert thought I was taking her skin off!

Bert is so proud of her cria and looks better than she has done for ages.

I still can’t work out what colour the cria is - she looked a bit grey at first but I think that was just the mud.  She might be a sort of fawn but it is nothing like Yoda.  We’ll have to wait and see.  Anyway, back to another evening and night in the caravan but I am going to get a bath in somewhere!  Carl’s favourite saying at the moment seems to be, “Well, we must still look after ourselves “  Which appears to mean he wants feeding and I have forgotten him in my rush to organise cria feeding!  So, finally, Bert’s baby!!

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21/07/2009 by Rosemary.

Mum told me to come and write this as she is in the field with Dad trying to rescue a cria.  Bert had her cria while we were back at the house and it got very wet and she has not made any milk.  It is a girl.  Mum will write about it tomorrow.

from Sam

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