DMAR Alpaca and Maremma Blog

DMAR Dominique, DMAR Valentino, and DMAR Domingo sold on Jan. 27th. A big thanks goes out to Raf and Lisa Camberos of Thunder Mountain Alpaca Ranch in Hereford, AZ.

 Our blue ribbon maiden, DMAR Dominique, is bred to our blue ribbon male, HRAZ Lock & Load, for a December 2010 cria. When people feel Dominque’s fiber the first thing they remark on is how dense her fiber is. Then they are amazed at her architecture of crimp and fineness. As you can see in the picture Dominique has coverage from head to toes. She will make the Camberos’ a wonderful foundation female.

HRAZ Lock & Load was selected to breed to DMAR Dominique, because of density, typey look, coverage, and fineness. We believe this pair will give the Camberos an incredible cria. Lock & Load currently has four offspring on the ground. The very first, DMAR Magnum, is a 2x blue ribbon winner and a reserve color champion. He is also the sire to 4th place winner, DMAR Mercedes. His other offspring, DMAR Remington and DMAR Chanel, will not begin their show careers until the Fall of 2010. HRAZ Lock & Load is available for stud. Click Here for more information on HRAZ Lock & Load.

DMAR Valentino is a gorgeous rose grey yearling male. Last year I sold his fleece before it was even off his body. Valentino has a wonderul temperment and will surely be a great addition to the Thunder Mountain Alpaca Ranch. Lisa’s daughter, Lexi, will be showing DMAR Valentino in the performance classes and has already begun training.

 DMAR Domingo is now just shy of being 5 months old. His dam is AVR By Golly Miss Molly and sire is DMAR Apollo. Domingo has quite the personality and he loves to talk. Lexi has begun to halter train him and we were all quite surprised when last week he walked calmly with Raf on the way to the scale. Thunder Mountain Alpaca Ranch has plans for this future herdsire.

Click Here to view our current alpaca sales list.

Maremma Pup, Aspen, Finds Home in CO:

Aspen, female Maremma pup, left this past Sunday with new owner, Ish Phillips of Walls Edge Alpaca Ranch, to live in Colorado. She is the first puppy to leave our ranch, but she is in good hands and will be guarding approximately 10-15 alpacas. Before she left we had her vaccinated, dewormed, and microchipped. Tom said she didn’t even cry when he placed her into the kennel. She was well behaved all the way to the airport and then even more behaved when she met Ish. It really has paid off to introduce the kennel to the pups when they were 3 weeks old. Keeping it in their area for playing and sleeping has made it less stressful on the pups.

On Monday I sent Ish an email to see how Aspen was liking her new place. Ish was kind enough to allow me to post a direct quote from his email back to me. Here is what he said: “Aspen seemed to be happy with her digs.  It looked like she slept in her coop on the straw.  I introduced her to the boys this morning.  They are a bunch of wimps.  Everytime she would get up and take a step, Max would alarm call and he wasn’t even in the same pasture as Aspen.  She seemed right at home in the pasture, just keeping her distance from the boys but always watching.  Chris took her over to the girls tonite and they were quite curious.  We saw more smarts in one day from her than we have seen in a lifetime with other dogs.  Chris absolutely adores her and can’t wait to see her full size because she probably wants another one.  In fact, put us on your waiting list for Gianna’s litter.  All i can say is aspen has really wowed us on day 1.  Thanks again to you and tom for everything.” 

What else can I say? I love happy customers and am thrilled that Aspen has a good home.

I still have puppies left. 3 males and 1 female. They are 9 weeks old now and ready to go take care of your herd of alpacas, sheep, goats, etc.. Contact me for more information.

Maremma Reference for DMAR:

Janice & Tom,

We want to thank you so much for the opportunity to purchase our Maremma LGD “Poppy” from you. She is just the best and is a huge part of our family.

It amazes me how Poppy can sense a coyote anywhere close by and intimidates them so that they don’t even consider coming onto the property. The one that was stupid enough to come close to the fence she had cornered in just a matter of seconds. It is so reassuring knowing that I don’t have to worry about the alpacas or other livestock with Poppy on patrol.

We recently added a papillion puppy to our family and while ferocious and intimidating to anyone/thing not welcomed, Poppy is so gentle with the new puppy. Poppy knows that she is part of the family and treats her as such.

Thank you again from the bottom of our hearts for introducing us to this incredible breed and making it possible for us to own (be owned) by one.

Mike & Lorraine Smith of Alpaca Knolls

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Thanks Mike & Lorraine. I am thrilled that you love your Maremma, Poppy. May you have many, many years with her guarding your livestock!

Taking Care of a Maremma LGD Puppy is not much different than taking care of any other puppy. They are mischievious and curious, therefore, they need to be watched and the area needs to be puppy proofed. This means making sure that any openings are closed off, so the pup cannot escape or get into areas or pastures they shouldn’t be in.

Supervising your Maremma lgd puppy is absolutely necessary while introducing the pup to its livestock. The fear in the beginning is not that the Maremma pup will hurt the livestock, but that the livestock may hurt the puppy. While still young a swift kick could end the puppy’s life. It is best to not leave your puppy with the herd unsupervised until they are able to run away from the livestock. This usually occurs at 3 to 4 mths of age.

Large breed puppy food should be fed to the Maremma lgd for at least for the first 6 mths. After that you should slowly switch to a large breed adult diet. Large breed adult food has less protein in it than puppy food and will help the Maremma pup to not grow too quickly and lessening any growth issues. Always provide fresh clean water.

Maremma lgd’s are found nationwide. My Maremmas live with the livestock 24/7. Our temps go as low as the teens in the winter and as high as 105 in the summer. As long as the Maremma has shade in the summer and shelter to get out of the wind the lgd will be fine.

All Maremma puppies need to be vaccinated at 8, 12, and 16 wks. Your vet will probably have a puppy package you can purchase or you can ask your vet what type of vaccine you should purchase for your area. At 16 wks you will also want to vaccinate for rabies. This is really important as your dog may come across a rabid animal while protecting his/her herd.

Maremmas are loyal to their family and weary of strangers. They are wonderful with children and the household pets.

Maremmas will bond with the livestock and consider them their own. The livestock too will learn to respect the Maremmas. They will be able to decipher between barks, which are to be ignored and which mean to get up and flee.

Maremma lgd pups do not need to be trained on how to guard. This is instinct for them and the breed has been doing so for centuries. However, the puppy will need to be taught to be obedient. Commands such as sit, stay, and drop need to be reinforced to have well behaved dogs.

The biggest fear most ranchers have is that the Maremma will hurt their livestock. This is a reasonable fear, but usually only occurs to the ranch in which the puppy was not supervised and reprimanded on unacceptable behavior.

Overall Maremma lgd puppies will grow into wonderful guard dogs. They will give their owners unconditional love and will guard their herd to the death. I simply love this breed!

Maremmas of Desert Mountain Alpaca Ranch:

Santino (laying down) and Biancaneve.

Vincenzo (standing) and Donatella

Gianna – 11 mths old.

2010 TxOLAN Spectacular Alpaca Show:

Held in Ft. Worth, Texas will be a level IV show. This means they expect to have at least 500 entries. The show will be held at the Will Rogers Memorial Center and is free to the public. Great fun and lots of alpacas to see. For more info go to http://www.txolan.org/alpaca-show.asp.

Tom and I will be taking our 2x color champion, DMAR Princess, and reserve color champ, DMAR Magnum. We are truly excited and can’t wait to for the show date to arrive.

Mark your calendars and plan a visit to the show!

Happy New Year from Desert Mountain Alpaca Ranch:

If you are like me you are embracing 2010 with open arms. I am optomistic that this will be the year of change and more prosperity for us all. I am thankful of 2009, but I was ready to say good bye to it back in August.

Here at the ranch I held my females open until the end of December. I missed two shows this fall since I was on cria watch and I hate missing shows. Not to mention that I had to back out of one vendor event due to a sick newborn cria. Good news is that the cria is now 3 months old and is totally healthy. Other events came and went with our fingers crossed that the dam would hold onto the cria for another day or two. I won’t have any of that next year, so all females opened stayed opened until the end of December. Here are the breedings we did:

(1) 2x Reserve Color Champion, DMAR Royal Knight (beige) to AVR By Golly Miss Molly (tru black).

 DMAR Royal Knight is a full Peruvian grandson of Royal Fawn. Beautiful fleece and the typey alpaca look. DMAR Royal Knight is available for sale at 1/2 interest and is now available for stud.

 AVR By Golly Miss Molly is a proven female with plenty of milk. Molly is for sale and comes with a free rebreeding to any fully owned DMAR herdsire.

(2) Multiple blue ribbon winner, Snowmass Incan Emperor to DMAR Electra.

 Snowmass Incan Emperor is a MRG full Peruvian proven herdsire. Offsprings include 2x Reserve Color Champion, DMAR Armani, and 2x blue ribbon winner, DMAR Nikoli. Incan has produced crias ranging in color from fawn to the greys both rose grey and silver grey. Incan Emperor is available for stud. He is co-owned with Square Top Ranch, but he is currently at stud at my ranch in Hereford, AZ.

 DMAR Electra II – We have paired this female for her 2nd go around with Snowmass Incan Emperor. We are so impressed with their last cria, DMAR Dolce (shown in picture) that we just had to repeat the breeding. Dolce’s fleece and conformation is everything and more than we expected. We have high hopes for this little cria. Can’t wait for her to reach juvenile so we can take her to the shows.

(3) Snowmass Incan Emperor and Wall’s Edge Shasta:

 Walls Edge Shasta is a full Peruvian white female. We paired her to Snowmass Incan Emperor, because we simply love what he is producing with whites and this will keep the cria full Peruvian.

(4) 2x Reserve Color Champion, DMAR Armani, to Reserve Color Champion, DMAR Athena:

 DMAR Armani is son of Snowmass Incan Emperor. His lineage includes Incan Magic, Peruvian Hemingway, and PPeruvian Victor. Armani is a compact male with wonderful fleece stats and density. DMAR Armani is for sale at 1/2 interest. He is also now available for stud.

 DMAR Athena is a beautiful young female who has 2 offspring on the ground. The first is a male named DMAR White Russian whose fleece stats are just wonderful. He is also a blue ribbon winner. Her second cria, DMAR Chanel, currently 2 months old is simply gorgeous. Athena is for sale with cria at side. She comes with a free rebreeding to any fully owned DMAR herdsire.

(5) Presidio son, HRAZ Lock & Load to DMAR Dominique:

 HRAZ Lock & Load is a blue ribbon winner. He currently has 4 offsprings on the ground and one of which is a Reserve Color Champion, DMAR Magnum. Other crias will not be shown until the Fall of 2010. At this time his record is 50/50 boys to girls. Two more crias are due this month.

 DMAR Dominique, blue ribbon winner, is super dense with beautiful architecture in her crimp. Dominique is a sweet girl and is for sale with a free rebreeding to any fully owned DMAR Herdsire. Coverage on Dominique goes from her top knot to her toes.

If you are interested in more information on any of the herdsires listed above Click Here.

If you are interested in more information on any of the alpacas listed above for sale Click Here.

January Birthings:

Both Kaitlyn-Rose and Alpha Carina are due to birth this month. Kaitlyn’s day 335 starts on Jan. 10th and Carina’s on Jan. 28th. We are super excited and waiting quite impatiently.

Maremma Puppies Available for Sale:

The puppies are currently six weeks old. They are healthy and robust. As you can see in some of the pictures they are very playful now as well. Sweet personalities on all of them.

We currently still have available 2 females and 3 males. We are running a promotion in January: Purchase any alpaca at $2000 or more and get a free maremma livestock guardian puppy for free.

If purchasing a puppy alone females are $850 and males are $750. Price includes first shot, first worming, micro-chip, and registration paperwork. We will be going to TxOLAN in February, so we can transport the puppy there for free.

Contact us at info@desertmtnalpacas.com to reserve your pup or call 520.803.9569.

Dates:  February 20 and 21, 2010

Times:  10 a.m. to 4 p.m. each day

Event:  Free education covering a wide range of alpaca topics, from basic husbandry and ranch set up, to setting up a ranch store and increasing foot traffic on your farm, learning to felt, and  marketing and selling in the new economy.

Also:  demonstrations including fleece preparation and fiber arts

Lunches will be available for purchase on site.  Snacks and drinks will also be available.

Participating ranches include (in no particular order):

Square Top Ranch LLC (our host ranch)
Desert Mountain Alpaca Ranch LLC
Cienega Creek Farm
Madera Canyon Alpacas and Fiber Works
Cloud Dancer Alpacas

You must reserve your space for this event. Leave a comment with your email address  if you would like to attend and I will be sure to send an invitation to you.!