Arts & Crafts

Combing the arts of design, supplies acquisition, construction and painting, we have completed our sign! Along the bottom we will hang notices like Open Farm Today 10-4, Yarn & Roving, etc. -- as soon as I make them. When granddaughters are here next week, we will plant a flowerbed beneath it.

People enjoy this road as a lovely "back-door" drive into Eugene, and the sign will capture the curiosity of passers-by for Open Ranch Days. We love visitors!

Very Local Painters
As Mike and I unloaded the van recently, we noticed a car driving slowly past, and a few minutes later, it returned up the hill. The car stopped across the end of the driveway and the passenger jumped out, rushing to introduce herself as a neighbor from a nearby street. She and her friend were in search of a place to set up their easels and paint boxes, to watercolor landscapes before daylight eluded them. We made our introductions and invited them to look around for a vista that would work.

Cathy and Victoria are members of Plein Air Painters of Eugene, and they go out each week, rain or shine, to paint outdoor scenes. Enjoying their enthusiasm and expertise, I invited them to come again, and they connected me with their fearless leader, Brooks. Now Aragon Alpacas is on the painters' April calendar, and we look forward to hosting the group, rain or shine.

Spinners' Camp
Mike gifted me with my first trip away from the farm since the alpacas began to arrive last March by taking over my chores while I attended a 4-day spinners' retreat at the Silver Falls Conference Center. The EWES (Eugene Wednesday Evening Spinners) get away for a long weekend every spring and fall. This time, 16 clever, bright, creative, energetic women shared their expertise and joy as we spun, knitted, crocheted, and laughed our way through the days, pausing only to eat and sleep.

Besides me, the EWES welcomed two other newcomers to the retreat, one a knitter, the other a crocheter. We stayed in threesome cabins, and geek-knitter Andrea bunked with Elissa and me.

No longer can I shyly claim to be a beginning spinner, although as with everything else, there is always more to learn. I came home with a greater appreciation for fiber arts and a heightened self-confidence in my spinning abilities.

I learned to ply my early spinning attempts into chunky yarn. With practice, and from watching others, I can spin more delicately. Now to complete some other projects on the needles so I can knit something from my beginner yarn. Much like the first pot that comes out of the kiln in pottery, this first yarn attempt will be memorable for its own lessons and reasons.

I have signed up for the 'wheel mechanics' class at Black Sheep to learn which knob to turn when, and how to alter the functions of my double-drive Ashford Traveller wheel. Hopefully the four births due mid-June will be accommodating so I can attend this session!

The Art of Weaning
While dancing with the rain these spring days, I am weaning cria: day weaning for a week, and then 24/7. Troubadour and Jedlicka are looking especially damp, although beneath all of that alpaca fleece is a very dry animal.

Mike is drafting plans for another shelter, to increase the use of our pens. Then we can house the kindergarten class of weanling boys in the male area.

Brew-crafting
Oh, and we've purchased four hop rhizomes as starter vines. In home-brewing, hops are one of the most expensive ingredients. By growing our own, we'll not only have enough for the recipes, but also for making into fragrant wreaths and arrangements.

Our beekeeper brought by a bucket of honey and recipes for mead, so that's on our agenda, too!

(our little cabin in the woods at Silver Falls' Retreat)

Crazy Feet!

For an hour or so each afternoon, I have been letting the dams and crias (25 total) out into the hayfield. As soon as they see me heading toward the gate, they run ahead in anticipation. That's Sable, practically attached to my shoulder.

The young alpacas especially love to romp on the 10 acres, and sometimes the dams join in the pronking (boing... boing... boing, as if they're spring-loaded). Then they break into a full-out run, and sometimes do a side-kick that Mike fondly calls "crazy feet."

The hay field remains a perplexity to us. If we plant orchard grass (alpaca's hay of choice), at the most nutritious time in its growth cycle for mowing, the weather is too wet to cut it. And if we leave it to grow until the weather is dry enough, the plants flower and go to seed, draining the leaves of nutrition. So last year we planted horse blend (timothy, rye, orchard grass and one other), and it was indeed harvested when most of the grass and seed heads were dry.




Most of the 420 bales we sold -- folks just came and loaded up their trucks right in the field. We used some of them as a boundary for our garden, and I have built up layers of compost within it over the fall and winter months. (We can even hollow out places to plant trailing vegetables atop the bales.) And some bales we stacked in the barn as wind-breaks in stalls, and to be used as bedding on the concrete floor. A few of the alpacas choose to munch on it for diversion, but it offers very little food value for them. Granola, I call it, because it is just a crunchy snack.

Weights and Measures
I started the year by getting a weight on each alpaca. Most do not mind being haltered and led to the scale, and some stand there more calmly than others. A few need patient coaxing, and two refused to budge, so I had to enlist help from a friend. Fabia is the most reluctant to be 'processed' for anything she considers unnecessary. But she also loves her carrots, so she was easily lead, unhaltered, to the scale and stood quite happily while munching on the dish of sliced carrots I held in front of her. I woulnd't mind if they all did it that way!

I do not spit-test the girls in winter months, because I would not breed them if they became open. We will test them again at end of March, hoping all pregnancies have held. The first four births are due in mid- to late June. Most of the other dams are due in Sept and October.

Since the winter sun is at such a low angle, we give Vitamin D paste to the crias bi-weekly. At end of day, while the adults are enjoying their pellets, the crias come into the creep feeder to eat unchallenged, so it is simple and safe to catch them there and give them a dose of 'orange sauce.'

Even though there are not as many chores to do for herd maintenance during the winter, the season brings on many more farm tasks. Mostly due to the weather and the latitude. In mid-December, I began afternoon regathering from the day pastures and feeding at 3;30 in order to be done by dark.

Once we passed Winter Solstice, the days began noticeably lengthening. Reading the Farmer's Almanac, I discovered that as days lengthen again, daylight extends about four times faster at the end of the day than at the beginning -- a fact of Nature I never realized when holding an office job!

Frost is Our Friend
The frost is often quite beautiful, caught cobweb-like in fuzzy ears or outlining leaves and grass blades. Mud and ice offer their own challenges. When the ground is so wet, the riding mower with trailer is unusable for poop scooping so we reverted to pushing wheelbarrow. A 4-wheel drive 'gator would be handy, but we haven't made that investment yet. And so far, we do not feel the need to get a tractor.

We put straw down on the pathways so they are less slippery. I did land on my tush one time and had to carefully sit sideways for a few weeks until the tail bone bruise healed. But we also discovered that frost is our friend. After driving a load of wood down to the workshop, the van kept spinning on the way back up the driveway. Early the next morning, the ground had frozen and Mike was able to drive it up just fine. I used the same technique to move the mower with trailer around for the next few mornings, and once again could take the load down to fertilize the hayfield.

Winter sets in

Strange winter happening outside. It hit pretty hard in December, was quite the adventure driving to work on ice - spent a couple hours on a blocked freeway one morning when I was supposed to get to work early to install some new software. After a week or two of this stuff, it warmed up (to freezing) and it's held there at night ever since. Days are a balmy 40-45, though. Crisp but not really cold.

Had a good Christmas on the farm, fairly quiet but we're not really removed from family here, just at the other end of the wireless.

The WinterBrau - a nice quiet reflective Organic Brown Ale - I made in November (dubbed it Amber Waves because we bottled it on Veteran's Day) sat in our Alpaca Store, where the heaters have been off all winter. As a result, it must've thought it was a Lager and never quite carbonated in the bottle. But it isn't bad, and I discovered that bringing it in the house for a week or two before opening one helps.

How to boil the wort in a deep-fat turkey fryer.

Then my lady surprised me by smuggling my daughter into the state for a visit. It was a Great Christmas present. We went up to Oakridge where I was born and played in the remaining snow one day. My family will recognize this picture as the selfsame spot we all learned to swim as kids, and yes, you're right - that water never does warm up. But it is beautiful up there.

Meanwhile, the alpacas don't seem to notice that it's cold out. They do prefer their water LIQUID though, so Ann's been hauling buckets of boiled water all over the farm to melt the ice in their waterbuckets. We should have some better solution ironed out by next winter...

Dawn meets Dusk

The last cria born to our herd this year arrived on Monday, September 29, and thankfully it was a simple, quick birth.

Murphy Brown is generally the first to greet me in the mornings, and very interactive with me when I'm in the pens. About three weeks ago during evening chores, I noticed her sitting very still, then sometimes rolling as if uncomfortable. I thought perhaps the baby was shifting and pressing on a nerve, and consulted our vet for his advice. Since Dr Pat was in our area the next day, he stopped to check her.

From my description, he suspected a uterine torsion (twist), but Murphy's heart rate and temperature were normal, which is generally not the case if there is a torsion. They are more common when the fetus us large, and if anything, Murphy looked small for her 10+ months of pregnancy. But when he did a manual check, there was a definite rotation of the ligaments supporting the cervix.

Torsions are rare, and most are "right-twist." Only one in 20 twist to the left, and that was Murphy's case. He could reverse it with external manipulation, but it would take three people, so I called our neighbor Elissa to come and help.

Once Murphy was mildly sedated, we got her to cush and rolled her on her left side. Dr Pat held and pushed on her uterus as Elissa turned her hind quarters and I rotated her neck and front legs. We returned Murphy to cush (upright) position and rolled her in the same manner one more time. Upon another manual check, Dr Pat declared her returned to normal positioning.

I kept a close eye on Murphy for the next few days, and she was once more her curious, interactive self. She's a tall, elegant dam, but needed some extra weight in the last few weeks of pregnancy, so she eagerly anticipated her morning bowl of pellets, rice bran and a handful of alfalfa for added calories.

Last Monday morning, I did not immediately see Murph's engaging face, so I went looking for her. She was one of the last to emerge from the barn, and when she turned, I saw that she had begun birthing. The cria's head and two legs were out, though still encased in the unbroken sac. I nicked it to release the water, then edged Murphy into a clean pen, and the other curious looky-lou's out.

Keeping a watchful eye on her, I gathered towels, the cria kit, a note pad and pen, and my camera. Within 15 minutes the baby was on the ground, a healthy, normal boy. There is little fluid and no blood with a normal birth, but the morning air was cool, so I towelled him lightly and stepped away.

I was thrilled to see that the cria was black, for this is the first offspring of our vicuña-colored herdsire, Canzelle's Orion. He is bred to two other black dams, and soon to a gray one. Orion's sire is medium silver gray Patagonia's Quijote, so we are hoping that Orion will also produce gray.

This is Murphy's second cria, and she is an attentive mom. Elissa and visiting friend Una came over to see him. We kept our distance to allow mom and baby to bond, while I took notes of when he sat sternal, tried to stand, tried to nurse, etc. Although he seemed small to me, he weighed 15.7 lbs that afternoon. By Friday, he had already gained two lbs.

Murphy still gets her morning bowl of calories, to increase her weight during lactation. On a scale of 1-5, she is a 2.

We have named him Navarre, the black-clad captain in the tale of Ladyhawke who cared for her each dawn, then turned into a wolf at dusk as Isabeau reclaimed her human form. Since Ladyhawke was the first cria born to us this year, it seemed fitting that the last one is black Navarre.

Ladyhawke greeting Orion's Navarre

Herd Alert - One Male's Perspective

On one of our first visits to an alpaca farm, we were standing in the pasture with the dams when they heard a coyote. The high-pitched, staccato alarm echoed through the group, all turning with necks and ears upright to face the direction of the danger. Immediately, the sentinel llama ran in the direction of the unseen marauder while the dams all ran in the opposite direction, circled up with the cria protected in the center, much like a wagon train under attack.

Alpacas make few sounds, and a 'herd alert' is generally used only for imminent danger. But some alpacas are more 'alert-y' than others. When we took our dog to a ranch that I had visited many times and kept her at a distance, Promise sounded the alert while the others quietly maintained a 'watch and wait' attitude. But as prey animals, it's always good to be cautious.

On a few occasions the distress signal has awakened us in the middle of the night. We jump up, pitch on jeans, jackets and shoes, grab the flashlights stationed by the door and head out to determine the cause. (We do not have livestock guardian dogs.) So far, we have only spotted the reflective eyes of deer meandering through our hay field on the way to the adjacent property. Before cross-fencing and critters moved in, this used to be their territory, too.

Last week during evening chores, as I exited Galileo's pen he sounded 'herd alert.' I looked all around and could spy no approaching danger. None of the other animals were on alert status, either by posture or sound. But Galileo was insistent and continued the shrill alarm.

Mike and I both looked all around and in the direction Galileo was facing. Finally we determined that the 'danger' he perceived was that the five yearling males in the pen next to the females, grazing along the same fenceline. As King of the Mountain, Galileo interpreted that as a strategic threat to his girls.

Shaking a dish of pellets, we enticed the boys back to their shed and closed them off from the neighboring pen. That was resolution enough for Galileo. He settled down and soon everyone went back to grazing.

All the while, our other herdsire, Orion, stood erect in his pen with his back to the drama, as if to say "I am not a part of the problem, I am not challenging you." These intelligent animals have a specialized system of body language that we continue to learn.

In the wild of the Andes, a macho herdsire stands atop a hillock and surveys his herd. Galileo is definitely in his prime and behaving exactly as he should. It's the silly humans that created this frenzy with our lack of understanding. If it weren't for the enforcement of fences, Galileo would have chased the boys away himself. So it was our job to rectify the disorder we'd created and return calmness to the herd.

This herd alert was not quite the heart-pounding rush of a 2:00 a.m drill by search-light, but very solvable once we paid attention. The alpacas listen and watch; as their shepherds, we must listen and watch them.

Moments later, a relaxed Galileo was eating his pellets out of my hand, satisfied that 'his girls' were safe.

Playing Barn

As a kid, I used to enjoy "playing house" — going to the store on my tricycle, cooking Tinkertoys for dinner, bathing the teddy bears and putting them to bed. So once when Mike came to find me puttering about in the barn, he innocently asked, "Whatcha doin' ?"

I paused for a moment, then replied with a smile, "Playing barn."

It seems such an apt term for the hum of delight that I feel at being able to work in this structure that is 108 years old (give or take a few), setting up my supplies, arranging the halters on a wrack that I built, watching the alpacas watch me as I move about their quarters. Like a giant jigsaw puzzle, every part of what I do is somehow connected to another part: raking poop, fluffing hay, weighing crias, halter-training, spit-testing. And on I hum...

Whenever our granddaughters visit, they join right in the circle. The girls quickly learned 'gate ettiquette,' moving aside so the animals will proceed through without feeling threatened; and always closing a gate behind you. We haltered the yearlings and took them for a walk to a different pasture. And fed the big boys carrot treats. Alpacas and children seem to have a natural affinity. Perhaps its the playfulness and curiosity of both that makes them easy companions.

During their week here, Gwen was often out with the dams, just watching them, talking to the crias, or filling a water bucket. She went to horse camp this summer, and taught me a new knot. Sheba is on a 30-day penicillin regimen, and now I use the daisy knot when tying her to a fence post each morning for her shot.

Annika discovered that if she gets down close to the ground, a curious cria will come near to check her out.

We also went to the Creswell Farmer's Market where our friend Elissa was spinning and selling some of her sheeps' fleece. For dinner that night we feasted on dusky brown 'Black Prince' heritage tomatoes and herbed goat cheese, and lots of crookneck squash with onions.

During these Indian summer days, I've been revisiting my garden plot, adding more lasagna layers to it so the decomposition will make it ready for planting next spring. Even throw-away fleece (too short/ dirty/ coarse) becomes a layer in the garden. The rest of the fleece has been sorted into projects: some destined for yarn from the mini-mill, some for felting into pet beds, some for the Alpaca Blanket Project with Pendleton, and some for my own hand-crafting and spinning. So many ideas, so little time!

Other family hand-crafting includes homebrewing beer. In April, Matt and Mike brewed an India pale ale and a Scotch red ale. This trip, Gwen assisted in the counter-top labeling process. (typing paper labels floated on a saucer of milk and placed on the bottle, excess blotted off)

Downs and Ups of Animal Husbandry

As of the last posting, we were excited about the duo alpaca births, and still anticipating two more. We worked outside all day on Saturday and kept a close eye on Flora (slightly overdue). Didn't observe anything unusual or any pre-labor activity like straining at the poop pile.

On Saturday night, she was very quiet. In fact, she remained cushed in one place the entire night, for I went out and checked on her several times, and again at dawn. Just before 8:00 she started laboring, but something was not right. It was a brownish placenta she was delivering, not a cria.

We called alpaca friends, and the vet. Front feet were presenting along with a turned neck instead of the head. It took four of us to support Flora while Dr Pete delivered a stillborn female cria. She had likely only been dead for a day. Perhaps the umbilical chord had broken in the repositioning for birth. I had not seen Flora's water break, a sign of impending birth. We chose not to do a necropsy.

Dr Pete tended to Flora, verifying that her uterine lining had not been torn, that the vessels were pulsing normally, and flushing her with mild antibiotics. We gave her some homeopathy to assist with healing, and later, with grief. She grazed near her cria for awhile, saying her good-byes before returning to the barn with her herdmates.

Since Flora's milk was not stimulated by nursing, it did not come in. One teat swelled a bit over the next few days, but there was no milk to express. On the doctor's advice, we are cutting back on her pellets for a week, putting carrots in her bowl for something to chew on while the others eat their pellets in the neighboring pen.

The temporary reduction in calories will assist drying her milk, as well as call on some of her reserves. Flora tends to be a full-figured girl, so this will help to get her back in balance. Before breeding again in late September, the vet will check to make certain there is no infection.

One day when the dams and crias were in the pasture next to the farm office, I noticed several of the crias sitting near Flora, as if comforting her. Alas, I did not have my camera handy, so the picture is only captured in my mind.

On the following Tuesday morning, I went out early to check Black Lace — the last of our dams due in August. She was cushed and birthing her cria, and from the slight dryness of its ears, I knew she had been laboring for a bit. I gloved up and went in to check the position. The cria's knees were bent, so Lace needed help. I was confident enough to identify the problem, but not to adjust the dystocia myself. My job was to Not Panic. Immediately I called Dr Pete and he came and delivered a healthy male, 19.1 lbs.

As with Flora, we will do a pre-breeding check to make certain there is no infection. This is advisable anytime human intervention is necessary to go in to deliver a cria.

Mike had to leave for work that morning. Since it was only Week 2 of a new job, he did not have the luxury of calling in late. But he was able to stay long enough to see a healthy cria safely delivered before he had to dash away.

We have named Lace's boy Rudulfo's Troubadour, for he and his mom hum to each other more than most. Troubadour's were Spanish/Moorish in origin, and their songs often included themes of chivalry and romantic love. He has the confirmation and fleece possibilities of a quality herdsire, so the love songs should serve him well.

Even with the sad loss of Flora's cria, it's a relief to have the births complete. The last alpaca due this year is Murphy Brown in early October with Orion's first offspring. Lately, Murphy has really begun to 'show' and she is eating more.

When Dr Pat was here last week to do well-cria checks and regular herd health, he also ultra-sounded four other newly-bred dams. With three of them, I was able to see the tiny 45-day fetus moving; on the fourth, Sable's breeding date was later, so the view only gave us a 50/50 chance of viable pregnancy. But we spit-tested her the next day and she ran and kicked at the male rather than cushing for breeding. We will u/s her again in a month.

Next project: tomorrow I will take Sheba (accompanied by her 2-month cria, Jedlicka) to OSU to radiograph her jaw to determine the cause of a chronic infection. She is a good traveler and will cush in the van on our hour-long trip.

Troubadour, keeping Flora company