DMAR Alpaca and Maremma Blog

2010 TxOLAN Results for DMAR:

DMAR Royal Peruvian Princess: 2nd and Reserve Color Champion. We were really surprised when Princess was pulled up from 2nd place to win reserve color champion. It is very surreal and to me worth so much more than simply winning it from the first place line. Go Princess!

DMAR Magnum: 2nd Place. We were really happy with Magnum’s placing. His class was a total of 10 and Magnum was the youngest in his group. The judge, Ken Hibbits, remarked how pleased he was that we brought Magnum in pasture condition. Ken whispered to Tom that Magnum was really dirty. However, Ken went on to say that even with Magnum being in pasture condition his fleece was really one of the finest of the class. Magnum drew a small crowd to check out his fleece after he came out of the ring. One ranch asked us to keep in touch as she was interested to breeding to Magnum when he was of age. Go Magnum!

DMAR Royal Knight- 1st and Reserve Color Champ at TxOLAN Fleece Show. The judge, Kathy Klay, told me that very few fleeces ever get points in the 80’s, only a couple of fleeces got in the 70’s, and that most fleeces received points in the 60’s. I was very pleased when I saw that RK received 71.5 points. Go RK!

We currently have 1/2 interest of RK for sale at a very reasonable price of $5000 for this 3x Reserve Color Champ. Click Here for more info on RK. Also, RK has recently begun his breeding career. Intro price is $850 on the first 3 bookings only. Contact us to reserve your breeding.

DMAR Armani – 1st Place TxOLAN Fleece Show. Again we were very pleased to see that Armani received 70.5 points out of Judge Kathy Klay. This means a lot to us. Go Armani!

Armani is a 2x Reserve Color Champ and multiple blue ribbon winner. Armani is up for sale at 1/2 interest at $5000.Click Here for more information on Armani. Also, Armani has begun his breeding career. His intro price is $850 for the first 3 bookings only. Contact us to reserve your breeding.

Snowmass Incan Emperor is the sire to DMAR Amani. He is available for stud. For more information on Incan Click Here.

 DMAR White Russian – 1st TxOLAN Fleece Show. Well I couldn’t believe it when I walked into the fleece room on Sunday afternoon to over hear a person complaining that they have been looking for Desert Mountain all day. I wasn’t certain I understand the ranch name correctly, but listened as the person went on to say that she had been to my stall several times and all over the building looking for me. I interrupted her to ask the name of the ranch and she said clearly, ” Desert Mountain.” I told her that was me and she quickly took me over to Ruski’s, nickname for White Russian, and asked how much for his fleece. She claimed it was exquisite and she was wanting to spin it up and make some lace scarves among other items. I gave her a price and she bought it. You go Ruski!

White Russian is a 4x blue ribbon winner and either himself or his fleece has only been entered into 4 shows. This boy is a prize and is currently for sale at a steal of a deal at $4500. Click Here for more information on White Russian.

DMAR Prada and Update on Maremma Pups:

We welcomed DMAR Prada on Feb. 3rd after waiting 359 days. Well worth the wait for this perfect little med. fawn female. She came out weighing 17 lbs. We held a name that cria contest on our fan page on facebook and Deanna Doria won with the name Prada. It was a tough decision as their were so many good designer names, but once we saw the cria we knew that Prada fit her best. She has beautiful crimpy fiber that would not straighten out as I was blowing her dry.

The dam, Kaitlyn-Rose, birthed easily. She has never had any problems birthing her crias. The issue with Kaitlyn is that her milk is slow to come in, so I am supplementing with a bottle every 3-4 hours. We are giving mom domperidone to help her drop down more milk. 

All of Kaitlyn’s crias look the same. If you wanted to know what Athena, Diego, Dominique, or Magnum looked like when born just take another look at Prada. We are super excited to have another female from Kaitlyn and look forward to adding her to our show string. All of Kaitlyn’s offspring have won in the showring and two have gone on to be reserve color champions. Kaitlyn is a wonderful foundation animal even though she is ditzy at shearing time not accepting her shorn cria for a couple of days.

 Once again the sire of Prada is HRAZ Lock & Load. His record is quite good with 4 females and 2 males to date. They all look wonderful and we will use them all in our show string this year. Click Here for more information on Lock & Load and his stud fee.

Well that is it for cria births until late September 2010. We have had a good birthing season with 5 female crias and 2 male crias being born. All are doing well and growing quickly. We even sold one of the males. Yippee!

Congratulations go out to Tammy West of Alpacas Re’al for purchasing our last female pup. We will be transporting this female to the TxOLAN Show next weekend for the exchange. We are very excited to have another of our pups go to an alpaca ranch.

We have 3 male puppies left. Contact us before they are all gone.

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.

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.

DMAR Results for 2009 Fall Festival:

DMAR Royal Peruvian Princess: 1st and Color Champion

Fall Festival was Princess’ 2nd show. This is her 2nd color championship as well. The judge remarked that she had density, architecture of crimp, and when you opened her fleece it opened up into micro bundles. He did also remark that her handle would feel softer had it not been for the dirt inside. Sorry folks, but we live in the desert. I have no grass. Even with the dirt she is still finer than the other alpacas.

DMAR Magnum: 1st Place

This is Magnum’s 2nd show and his 2nd first place winning. The judge remarked that Magnum was the finest in his class, had architecture of crimp throughout his fleece, and was dense. Overall he is the entire package. DMAR Magnum’s dad is HRAZ Lock & Load, who is available for stud. For more information on Lock & Load Click Here.

DMAR Dominique: 2nd Place

What a way for Dominique to end her show career. She has a blue ribbon winning, (3) 2nd place winnings,  and (2) 3rd place winnings. Dominique has beautiful crimp architecture throughout her fleece, is really dense, lock structure to be envied, and is baby alpaca fine. Dominique is daughter to AOBA Blue Ribbon Winner, HRAZ Lucian. Dominique is for sale and ready to start breeding. Click Here to read more on Dominique.

In addition to the above winners DMAR Armani took a 6th place. We also entered in three fleeces: DMAR White Russian – 1st, DMAR Armani – 2nd, and DMAR Royal Knight – 3rd.

This was a great show and we look forward to the next one!

DMAR Royal Knight: ARI# 30425811      1/2 Interest Price: $5000

 RK is a full Peruvian grandson of Royal Fawn. Bloodline also includes Caligula and Augusto. RK is a typey alpaca. RK is just about to turn 2 and start his breeding career.

DOB: Dec. 1, 2007

Sire: 105 Peruvian Royal Sun (now deceased)

Dam: GLA Peruvian Alexis

Color: Beige

2009 Histogram:  19.9 microns, std. dev. 3.8 microns, C of V 19.2%, mean curvature 45.0, comfort factor 98.4% 

Show Awards:

2008 NMSFAS – Reserve Color Champ & 1st Place

2009 Estes Park Fleece Show – Reserve Color Champ & 1st Place

2009 FABA Fleece Show – 1st Place

2009 NMSFAS – 2nd Place 

RK’s fiber is very dense like a berber carpet, but is baby quality fine. As you can see from the picture his fiber is full of crimp and luster.

We are looking for a partner as this male deserves to have his genetics passed on.

Financing available. Call us at 520-803-9569 or email us at info@desertmtnalpacas for more information.

DMAR Update for Week Ending 10/24/09:

Crias: To date all three crias, Domingo, Remington, and Chanel are doing great. Each of them has put on weight and getting stronger. Domingo and Remington are the best of friends and sometime next week I will move Chanel into the same stall/paddock that they are in. Already when I move the alpacas around for social time the boys are beginning to notice Chanel and chase her. It makes her nervous as she tries to get away, but when the boys are off chasing each other I see her sometimes following in suit. They are simply adorable.

Southwest Fiber Festival: Is this weekend in Amado Territory Ranch from 10 am til 4 pm. We will be taking down the store again (Tommy wants to kill me) and setting it up for the one day event. As far as alpacas we will bring Diego and Nikoli. Diego is beautiful and super friendly, whereas Nikoli is very laid back and a real eye catcher with his dark head and white face. Everyone is always wanting to take pictures of him.

ABR Fall Festival Alpaca Show: The show is held on Nov. 7th & 8th in Lovett, CO. This will be our 2nd time attending this show, but the first time in the new venue. We will be taking Princess, Dominique, Royal Knight, Armani, Versace, Magnum, and Valentino. Look out Colorado here we come. I’ll also be entering in fleeces for Royal Knight, Armani, and White Russian.

November Birthings: Mother and daughter, Alexis and Electra, are both due in November only 4 days apart. The sire is the same for both which is Snowmass Incan Emperor. I am so excited to see what we get from these pairings.

Michelle Rose: Is doing well. She is acting more like a youngster these days than ever before. She is pronking around and today I saw her go up on her hind legs trying to chest butt an unwilling participant. Well, she is in good spirits doing everything an alpaca should do. However, her lymph nodes still don’t seem any smaller. Time will tell if Michelle will ever be well enough to give us another cria. For now I just thrilled that she is feeling good enough to be playing.

So much to do with so little time, especially since I am back in school which means plenty of papers to be written. Yuck, but a busy bee is what I am.

A Little Early, But Domingo is Here:

DMAR Domingo was born to dam, AVR By Golly Miss Molly, on Monday, August 30th. Gestation time was 326 days. Although Molly seems to be birthing a little earlier each year we didn’t think she would go 9 days earlier. Well she believes in the theory of fall crias are born early whereas spring crias are born late.

Domingo was born at 10 am and weighed 16 lbs. Considering he was born early he has no premature qualities about him. His teeth have erupted and his ears are straight. We’re a little unsure of his coloring right now. It appears to be very dark brown or black on top and a lighter brown towards his under section. We don’t know if this is a bay black or not. I need to check. Anyway you can see that he is simply gorgeous and doing well.

This is a picture of Domingo’s dam, Molly. As you can see she too is doing well. She is a wonderful mother with plenty of milk. She is constantly giving Domingo kisses and clucking/humming at him. You can see that the bond is already strong. Molly is currently for sale and will go with cria at side. Click Here to view more information on Molly.

Domingo’s service sire is DMAR Apollo who is a  medium brown. Apollo is our Augusto grandson and blue ribbon winner. We chose Apollo for her fiber coverage and density. With Domingo just being 2 days old now it’s a little too soon to see if he has taken on his sire’s genetics. DMAR Apollo is available for breeding. Click Here for more information on DMAR Apollo.

Featured Alpaca – DMAR Antonio

DOB: 10/7/07                                                                Sale Price: $2300

Sire: Cresent Moon’s Tenacity

Dam: AVR By Golly Miss Molly

ARI: 30425200

DMAR Antonio is ready to become your next herdsire. He is a beautiful medium silver grey who is just shy of his 2nd birthday. Antonio’s has great conformation as you can see in his pictures. His legs are straight and his bite is correct. He has full coverage from his top knot to his toes with a typey head. Antonio is a great looking male with a personality to keep you on your toes. He is a little on the mischievious side for if you don’t keep your gates locked he will open them and let everyone out. Just like the typical trouble maker is does it all very quietly, so you don’t realize he is even manipulating the latch until the stall is empty and alpacas are running about.

Antonio’s grandfather is Cresent Moon’s Rayo del Sol, eight time champion. Antonio comes from a long lineage of greys. Unfortunately Antonio is related to all of our darker females, so keeping him just isn’t feasible.

Antonio goes with a full reproductive guarantee. We are also offering up to 6 months agistment (boarding) on him for free in case you are still working on your place.

Click Here for more information on DMAR Antonio.

You can reach us at 520-803-9569 or email at info@desertmtnalpacas.com.

Maremmas – Defenders of  Wildlife

This is a recent video that is about a farmer who has maremmas to protect his farm against predators, especially wolves.

I need to add a comment about the video:

You can make any dog sociable or unsociable. Although this family in the video felt the need to not allow their dogs to be lovable with them this isn’t always the case. My maremmas are lovable and part of our family and still will guard our ranch against strangers and predators. I don’t feel we need to be stand offish with them in order for them to do their job. They understand the difference between their owners, who they love and respect, and outsiders.

____________________________________________________________

Here at DMAR we have 5 maremmas protecting 26 alpacas. We do breed them and sell their offspring. We have been successful in placing them as working dogs for alpaca, goat, and sheep ranches. The new owners have raved about the dogs and their guarding instincts.

Just an update on Gianna, the maremma pup we imported directly from Italy: This picture was taken in April 2009 when she was only 8 weeks old. She weighed 30 lbs.

Here is Gianna now. This picture was taken just yesterday. Gianna is currently 5 mths old and weighs a little over 60 lbs.

So that is a 30 lb weight gain in just 3 mths, so please remember these dogs are going to be large.

Our dogs, Donatella ( laying down) and Vincenzo, will be bred this fall. We expect to have puppies around January 2010 with placements beginning in March.

To read more about DMAR maremmas Click Here. For questions or to be placed on our puppy waiting list, please click on the contact us link and fill out the form.