DMAR Alpaca and Maremma Blog

Getting ready for show season means taking alpacas to the vet to get the necessary tests and health certificates. This week I will be at the vet three times in total. The first trip was yesterday with the juveniles. I was quite surprised at how well behaved they were. All got into the trailer with limited issues. They stood quite still for the vet and within a half hour we were on our way home.

Today I took the older boys. For New Mexico they need to be TB and Brucellosis tested. This means that on Friday I need to take them back so that the TB area can be looked at. We’ve done this every year now, so I don’t expect any scares.

The first show is next month at the NM State Fairgrounds. We are very exited to show and hope for the best.  

 

Fiber Collection – This year Tom and I will be hosting one of the fiber work days at our ranch on Sunday, Sept. 7th. It will go from 10am until we are finished. Basically this day is spent doing quality control checks on the bags of fiber brought over. We check for cleanliness, length of fiber, second cuts or guard hair, and lastly the fineness of the fiber.

This year the fiber co-op of Arizona (you must belong to the Alpaca Breeders of Arizona Association in order to belong to the fiber co-op) plans on having hiking socks and sport weight yarn made. The socks are really warm and soft on the feet. The yarn will be 7 oz and soft like you couldn’t believe as we only put in baby alpaca fiber.

Right now my days are filled with cleaning fiber. I look forward to finishing and getting back my end product.

If you would like more information on our fiber co-op please feel free to contact me.  

 

Flies, flies, everywhere flies. This must be the worst year of fly infestation I have seen so far. At times they are all resting in an area on the ground and when you walk by they lift off the ground in a swarm. Unbelieveable.

Tom has purchased a biodegradable spray (pesticide) and it works great. Spray the area and in seconds you can walk by without being swarmed. The bad thing is that it only works for about 20 minutes. It is supposed to be used with a spray system. Unfortunately that is costly and even though the spray itself is a bit expensive we do see it is working. Maybe next year we can spring for the system.

The flies have caused some issues. They love to hang around our alpacas’ eyes. This caused a few of them to have eye infections. Poor Alexis had her entire right side of her face swell up. After I washed it out with saline solution and applied terramycin the swelling immediately started to go down. Within hours her face improved tremendously. However the next day we found her other eye and face beginning to swell. We treated both eyes just to be sure and everything is now clear. Next was Molly. Her face never swelled, but her eye was tearing a lot. We did the same treatment and she is now fine. The last to get hit was Carina. Her eye was tearing with a yellowish discharge. We had to treat her two times a day for about 3-4 days. She is now fine as well.

I have decided to take on a new defense against the flies. I have started to feed the birds in the hopes that I will attract insectivores. To date I have a pair of barn swallows who have set up a nest in my back porch. Normally I would remove the nest, but this is just the type of bird I need. They don’t eat seed at all and are purely insectivores eating flies among other type of insects. I hope they columnize.