What follows below is a reprint of the final husbandry article that appeared in the Spring 2010 issue (the final hardcopy produced) of Cas-Cad-Nac Farm Chronicles. For those of you that haven’t seen it before, here you go. For those of you that have already read it, my apologies. Again. If nothing else, I figure that…
We have just been through what has undoubtedly been one of the driest summers in recent memory. Easy evidence of this can be found in our pond here on the farm, which is down perhaps almost 4′ from its top level. Last summer by comparison that pond was overflowing well into July, if not August….
Some of the more frequently asked questions we field from other breeders and prospective alpaca owners, particularly this time of year, relate to the shearing of crias. Do we do it? If so, at what age and what are the benefits of doing so versus the downside of just leaving the tui fleece (the fleece…
So yesterday we completed a two day slog of trimming the toenails of roughly 200 animals, 2/3rds of them by yours truly. We do toenails every other month along with monthly Ivomec shots, routine vaccines, and body scoring on the entire adult herd. Though the pace is often quite blistering when we are starting out…
Admittedly it’s not always with a hop, skip, and a jump that we drag one of our carcasses up to the Arena each early morning during birthing season to see what gifts our due girls may have bestowed upon us. Having said that though, even my half awake, uncaffeinated self gets a little slack jawed…
It’s funny how even with all of the activities that take place here daily there are certain parts of the farm that even we don’t see or visit very often. One of those places is this beautiful little slice of heaven off the northeast corner of the CCNF Arena, what is known internally as pen/paddock…
