Test for new plugin:
I’m tired of having to retype entries onto multiple social networks. WordPress has a plugin that will supposedly link to my ping.fm account and from there will post to all the networks I have added. This will make my life much easier. So here is the test.
DMAR Alpaca Show Fleeces are Skirted:
Five show fleeces are now ready to be sent to Estes Park Wool Festival Alpaca Fleece Show today. I have pictures of three of the fleeces:
DMAR Royal Peruvian Princess:
Princess’ skirted fleece weight is 3.2 lbs of glorious crimp, bundles, and luster. Her blanket is fine and extremely dense. Princess has been to four shows and is a 4x Champ with 3 Color Champions and 1 Reserve Color Champion. I am very excited to see how her fleece does in the upcoming shows. This yearling female has not stopped impressing me with her beauty.
DMAR Royal Knight:
RK is full brother to DMAR Royal Peruvian Princess. Just take a look at his fleece shots. RK has very impressive crimp, bundling, and luster on top of being fine and dense. Weight for the skirted blanket is 3.55 lbs. RK has just turned 2 yrs of age in Dec. 2009 and we have begun using him in our breeding program. He has already settled his first female with a cria due in November 2010. We are currently looking for a partner in ownership of this young stud. For more information on either purchasing 1/2 interest or to reserve a breeding Click Here.
DMAR Magnum:
Magnum is another impressive boy out of our Kaitlyn-Rose. To date Kaitlyn has produced 5 offspring. Out of which 4 of them have won in the showring and 2 have gone on to win Reserve Color Champs. Magnum is an offspring of HRAZ Lock & Load and therefore is a grandson to Xanadu’s Presidio. Magnum is a 2x Reserve Color Champ. His blanket speaks for itself. Skirted weight is 3.25lbs. This yearling boy will definitely be part of our breeding program next year.
Unfortunately I didn’t get pictures of DMAR White Russian or DMAR Armani but I can assure you that they were equally impressive.
The first fleece show they will be entered into is the Estes Park Wool Show in Colorado. The last day to mail in fleeces is today and I’m ready.
In the meanwhile one of my newbie customers will be coming over with some blankets to be skirted. I will teach her how to do it and send her blankets off to Estes as well.
Ranch and house for sale in Hereford Arizona
We are getting closer and closer to moving out of Arizona to Georgia. Tom has made several trips now and I have been to Georgia at least once house hunting. We currently made an offer on a house, so we have our fingers crossed that we will get it. I will post pictures if and when the offer has been accepted.
We listed our ranch and house for sale about a week ago. Yesterday we held an open house for the realtors to preview. We’ve had one showing and it went well. We will hold an open house for the public either this Sunday or next depending on when our realtor is available.
The listing of the house can be viewed at http://www.longrealty.com/AZ/Hereford/85615/homes-for-sale/7107-S-Nucci-Lane-48975606/popup. You can also take a virtual tour at http://tours.tourfactory.com/tours/tour.asp?t=620494. We have an additional 4.77 acres that is being sold separately, but is right behind the house so a total of 9+ acres in all. Special concession for offers to purchase both. To view the land go to http://www.longrealty.com/AZ/Hereford/85615/landlots-for-sale/7107-Nucci-Ln-48306342.
This is a beautiful house on a corner lot. Plenty of space inside with 3 bedrooms and 2 baths. Plenty of stalls for alpacas, horses, goats, or any other livestock.
| May 15, 2010 | ||
| 8:00 am | to | 1:00 pm |
Bisbee Fiber Festival
The Bisbee’s Fiber Festival is tomorrow, May 15th at Warren Park starting at 8am and going through 1pm. We have attended this festival for the past 4 years and enjoy it very much. We expect tomorrow to be another great time for all. DMAR store will be there with this year’s shearing, yarn, hats, scarves, toys, and more! Be sure to stop by and say hello as this will be our final festival in Arizona. The next one we attend will be in Georgia.
Shearing DMAR Prada on 5/3/10 Video
Mike Morgan is shearing 2 month old DMAR Prada. She was very good with no spitting or screaming. I’m collecting the alpaca fiber and my mom is the videographer. DMAR Prada will be part of our 2010 show string. She is out of HRAZ Lock & Load and Kaitlyn-Rose.
We told Mike to leave a fuzzy face on the crias and to A frame all legs. He did a great job with all the alpacas. Perhaps the alpacas weren’t so thrilled on shearing day but over the past two days it has been in the upper 80′s and I’m sure they are relieved to have their fleeces off.
2010 Shearing is Over:
Monday, May 3rd we held shearing day at Desert Mountain Alpaca Ranch in Hereford, AZ. Originally we were supposed to shear on Thursday, April 29th but had to rearrange when our regular shearer, Pete Connelly, found himself in the hospital fighting an infection after cutting his knee with a shearing blade sharpener. Of course this would happen to Pete one week before shearing and as you all know finding a shearer at this time of year is close to impossible; however, Pete found us another shearer so with just moving the shearing a few days Mike Morgan came to shear.
Moving shearing day was not the easiest for us. Tom was scheduled to be in GA for training and my volunteers had rearranged their work schedules to be here on Thursday. We ended up losing some volunteers and Tom had to make other arrangements for work.
Another change for us was that Mike Morgan doesn’t trim teeth. This was sort of a blessing in disguise for me as I’ve been wanting to trim teeth ourselves for a couple of years now. Luckily a while back I traded transporting for a slightly used tooth-a-matic machine. Tom took it to work a few days before shearing and did some slight adjustments and we were ready. To my surprise Tom actually cut the alpacas teeth without asking me to do it. (If you know Tom at all you know he doesn’t do anything to the alpaca except to hold it). I was so proud of him but to tell you the truth if he didn’t do it I wouldn’t have been able to as Mike was so quick with shearing I barely had time to collect up the fiber before running to the next alpaca. Now that we are going to Georgia where the alpacas can graze it is even more important that their teeth are in the right shape.
We sheared 32 alpacas between 9 and 2:30 PM. Mike could have been done earlier but us old people (Tom) couldn’t keep up with him. You could see Tom slowing down as he brought each new alpaca in.
We had socks filled with rumen in which I collected immediately in a freezer zip lock bag. Tom froze them afterwards and we now have liquid gold. All that we will have to do is defrost the socks soak them in water and then drench up the rumen. We didn’t realize how precious this stuff is until we had an alpaca who stopped eating a couple of years ago. Luckily we were able to get a prego to spit back then but now we collect it at shearing and freeze.
Special thanks goes out to Pete Connelly (we will be using Pete next year) for finding us another shearer, Mike Morgan and his wife for shearing, and to my volunteers….James, Lisa, Laurel and most of all my mom for recording all the fleece weights.
Now it’s time to skirt the show fleeces and to figure out which fleeces are going to the fiber festivals and which I am going to have processed.
