Best of British Alpacas

Having spent two days at the Heart of England Fiesta I am showing you some snaps taken that Rob hasn't posted. The Best of British award goes to the alpaca that is best in the show that comes from two British parents. We have watched this award grow over the years.At one time you struggled to find any alpaca with an award that had one British parent never mind two. There were three British huacaya alpacas and two British suri alpacas that achieved Championships. Numerous other awards were achieved by alpacas with two British parents, including several alpacas here at Toft. That is a great result for the British Alpaca industry. Well done to Karen Oglesby, Meon Valley Alpacas for her excellent huacaya intermediate fawn male and Margaret Silver , Pinkney Alpacas for her impressive suri junior white male. Apologies to Karen. I never got a close up of you. I thought I had but damned if I can find it this morning! She is in the line up Champion Huacayas.

Fighting teeth. Must do something about them.

Three pet boys have been behaving fine together in their own paddock over the last three weeks. We do this so that we can monitor their behaviour having been removed from the large group and ensure they get on well with no bullying before they go to their new home. Wouldn't you know it? I was doing another session of halter training when I noticed one of the boys ears was bleeding. To cut a long story short the youngest of the group ( three years old this summer) had grown fighting teeth and had done some damage to his friend! These teeth are usually trimmed at shearing time. The two older males had fighting teeth last year that were removed at shearing. Over the last 16 years we have managed to avoid any injuries by ensuring removal at shearing. This warm weather does seem to set the boys off deciding who is boss of the field.
Antibiotic spray sorted the ear and Rob and Linda used the 'cheese wire ' to take the tops off these barbed teeth before they did any more damage. They behaved fine on the journey to their new home and appeared very settled when fitted with their new head collars and released into their new home ready for the children to come in from school. We have been told that there was a reluctance to go to school this morning cos they wanted to play with their new alpacas. Brilliant.

Sunshine ! Halter training is a pleasure.

What a difference a few degrees and some sunshine makes. Laura, our singer songwriter daughter is home for the weekend and got roped into helping. She knows that the noseband has to be on the bony part of the nose. Unfortunately one female would only keep standing if she was with her friends and on a long lead rein. Fingers crossed she will go into the ring on her own in a few weeks time.