Ladies and Gentlemen, may I present.....

The first arrival of the year greeted us this morning at 8.30 in the middle of a downpour.
 It was Tia's. Sitting and still coated in the birth membrane,so not many minutes old.
By the time we had got a towel, iodine and cria coat to the scene and checked mums milk was turned on the rain had stopped and we were able to dry it off and put a coat on before the next shower.
Not quite the cracking black girl we were hoping for but a dark brown boy will do nicely.

He's 8 kilos and full of beans but as yet unamed.

 

Will post some better pictures when he's dried off properly.

Where's our babies?

Everybody seems to be having cria at the moment, except us. I can't bear the waiting any longer.
Tia is currently at 354 days and Fanny is 361 days ! and not looking at all pregnant.
For weeks I have been keeping an hourly lookout in the field only to find things all hunky dory.
Quite a few mornings I could have happily laid in for a extra hour or so. But no.You have to get up and check.
Traipsing out in your dressing gown whilst the kettle boils only to find you should have stayed in bed.
It's all getting a bit annoying now. Some of the older girls due in August are definately pregnant carrying quite visable packages around with them and Bali's belly is amazing to watch with the cria turning cartwheels and trying to punch it's way out all the time.
 But Fanny keeps us guessing. Perhaps she is waiting for a change in the weather. It's actually been raining for days now so maybe it's just as well.
We did have a timely break in the weather on Saturday where we attended the local village agricultural comice at Malguenac. As well as a display of some pretty awesome machinery, including a tree eating monster that reduced whole trees,three or four at a time into tons of chippings in a matter of minutes, there was the usual cattle and Breton horse competitions.

 

 

 

 

 

 The alpacas drew a crowd as always and we sold a bit of our yarn. As it was only five minutes away from home we were able to nip back to keep up the cria birth checks. At the end of the day we had time to take the animals home and get back for the repas which included some fantastic hams that had been slowly cooking behind our stall all afternoon.

Writers block re righted

Regular readers of this dribble will have noticed a total lack of effort on my part over the last month.
So much so that in addition to the in-house jibes and prompting, people are ringing up to check that everything's ok.! and, upon establishing that everything is ok, registering their complaint and even threatening to remove this blog from their 'favourites' list if I didn't get my finger out!.
Well, flattered as I am that anyone gives a toss about what I have to say, I'm not sure I should succumb to emotional blackmail. The responsibility of spoon feeding the readership daily or even weekly words of wisdom is too much to bare. I mean, where will it all end?
I don't want to be held to account for depriving the annonymous of their 'fix' of 'alpaca news'. It's worrying.
Did Rafael Nadal drop the third set during the French open final because he was concerned? Or could this explain the Queens long face as she cruised the jubilee flotilla?
Ok,so I'm aiming a little high there. But you know what I mean.
The truth of the matter is I haven't done it. Not because I've been too busy. Not because I've been ill,or even because of a computer malfunction,which is usually a good excuse.
I just couldn't be arsed.
Well, honesty is always the best policy. Consider normal service now 'resumed'.

So, firstly I need to clear up a small matter regarding a previous posting which included a photo of an alpaca,and which due to the angle of the shot only appears to have three legs.
 Certain people have expressed their concern about the welfare of this animal and others questioned my sanity for  buying her. I kid you not.

I would like to clarify for the benefit of the gullible she is not at all tripodal but is equiped with the regular number of legs.One adequately placed in each corner. So no worries.

Shearing day was kind to us and the sun shone all day. Seems like ages ago now. Probably because it was.
The alpacas are all looking resplendent and sylph like and the fleeces have been skirted and bagged..

Indiana, (above) our rose grey boy was sold the moment his fleece came off and is being delivered tomorrow along with two others. In fact it's been a good week for selling boys. Imran has also gone this week to the lovely Monique and Didier all the way to Toulouse, and French Lad and Angove find new homes on Saturday.

 

 

Imran safely installed with his new black girlfriend

 Sometimes when you are feeling a bit bogged down with all the chores that come with this chosen lifestyle something happens to make you think "well, actually we've got it easy"
Meet Nicholas and Frederic . Two guys that we got to know a couple of weeks ago when we were asked to go and look over their newly acquired herd of alpacas.They wanted our opinion on various matters from health to breeding choices.They had a herd of around fifteen. Quite a lot you might think as a starter herd.But these boys were no strangers to large numbers. Their farm was something else.If it had four legs they were breeding it. Horses and poneys were their passion and there were fields full! A few rare breed cows too  thrown in for good measure. They also had sheep.They had goats. There were pigs roaming free around the courtyard.One of which had been serviced by a wild boar that had got to her and had just had a litter of twenty four piglets. A building had been converted to house Frederics collection of tortoises which were not just the common ones but giant ones that need regulated heating and a special licence.

A whole building was crammed full of every sort of feed with wall to wall chest freezers and sacks of all sorts of stuff.
But Iv'e saved the best till last.
The dogs. I've never seen so many dogs in one place. They just kept coming. wave after wave.
Gobsmacked,I asked how many they had. They truely didn't know the answer. "About seventy" Frederic said.
SEVENTY !

This picture shows only a few!
And the yard and fields were spotless.!
I shall never,EVER moan about picking up poo again!

Home and dry

The 'Stage' happened on Thursday and was a great success despite the weather trying it's hardest to spoil things.
It started going pear shaped on the Wednesday,when upon arriving at Rennes airport to collect Jay there was a two hour delay posted on the arrivals screen. This later changed to 'flight diverted' and the gale force winds had forced a change of route to Nantes.The passengers were then going to be brought over by coach. I was in for a long wait.
Anybody who has visited Rennes airport will know there is not a lot there to detract from the boredom, so after a light lunch and coffee I still had three hours to kill so it was off to the nearby Ikea store for something to do.
Carried away in the moment I duly managed to buy a hanging metal rack which is too wide to fit the alcove for which it was intended. A new rug to replace the flea bitten one we currently have but it's far too small and looks naff. Loads of new 'tupperware' type containers which apparently we don't need, and anyway there's no room in the cupboard. A bath mat that's too white and already looks dirty and a couple of collapsable linen baskets which are now destined for alpaca fleece storage!
But I did get a free pencil which I'm sure will be very useful.
It was early evening by the time I had collected the judge and got back home, so the plan to look over the herd with a view to selecting which animals to talk about and shear, was aborted.
The following morning was not looking promising with miserable drizzle and damp alpacas. But by about ten o'clock the sun made an appearance and things started to look better.We re-arranged the programme a little to give the alpacas a bit more drying time and by lunchtime we were shearing and even lunch was taken 'Al Fresco'.

The afternoon was spent skirting and discussing the the fleeces both on and off the animals and the merits and shortfalls of each one. We also covered dentition and husbandry issues.

Thanks to Jay Holland for a very interesting presentation and for managing to answer a constant barrage of questions. And to Gaby and Christelle for translating everything all day. Without them it just wouldn't have worked..
Today is Saturday and we were supposed to be shearing the rest of the herd but the weather hasn't improved so it's been put on hold for a while.One of the benifits of having a new French shearer!
Anyway there is still some clearing up to do. Catering for that many people some of whom stayed over a second night makes a lot of mess and the fridge is full of left overs.
All in little tupperware containers!

Stage de Tonte

It's been a long time coming but finally we have our very own worsted yarn to offer for sale.

18 kilos of home grown 70% huacaya 30%suri mix in four ply and double knit formats.

We are very pleased with the end product and the addition of a small amount of suri gives it a wonderful silky sheen.

It was spun for us in Cornwall by The Natural Fibre Company and watching the process was mind boggling.Machines for sorting,scouring, blending, carding even dying if you wished., all co-ordinated to run like clockwork.

What goes around comes around and we're only a week away from shearing again. Weather permiting we shall be doing the majority of the herd next weekend. But before then, Thursday 26th April we are holding our 'Stage de Tonte'. A day course to highlight the importance of correct shearing with demonstrations by Pascal Meheust along with shearer and B.A.S. Qualified judge Jay Holland who will be presiding over the days events,giving talks on fleece traits and stud selection amongst other things and hopefully benefitting everyone with his wealth of knowledge!
We decided to hold the course in association with Alpaga Developpement.It seems mainly for the benefit of new French breeders.There will be a translator on hand as so far 15 of the 18 places reserved are French..
I'm going to have another one of my headaches!

Jenson Buttons career cut short

The youngest fruit of my loins recently passed his driving test and last week got his first 'set of wheels'.
In truth he got everything but the wheels. A friend gave him a car but wanted to keep the alloys for a racing car project he was working on. So Jake became the proud owner of a 1992 Ford Fiesta with no wheels.
A good little car to start off with ,and, despite it being nearly twenty years old quite tidy and only 36000 miles!
Originally a Jersey registered car so I guess it's hard to put mileage on car restricted to 118 sq kilometres.

The new wheels and tyres were sourced from the local scrapyard in Pontivy along with a replacement door handle, petrol cap,wiper blades and seat belt to get it through the C.T. (MOT) New wheel trims and a battery were bought and a few hundred euros later it passed the test.

Here he is last week cleaning his first 'motor'. Aah bless.



However this tale has an unhappy ending I'm afraid. One week into car ownership we had the telephone call all parents dread this afternoon.
"Mum, I've crashed the car"
He,and his two friends in the car were all completely unhurt,thank god, but the car had hit the armco at the slip road to the dual carriageway and was in a bit of a state.
As well as all the panel damage the offside front wheel was flat on the floor and the drive shaft and suspension broken.
There was no way I could retrieve it.
 Ironically the accident happened about half a kilometer from the aforementioned scrapyard and it was them that had to clear the vehicle from the road. It has been declared a write-off and now the scrap yard owner has all his bits back and more.And we have to pay him to take them!
Life dishes out some hard lessons from time to time. My son is gutted to have lost everything so soon,and "at least you weren't hurt" is no consolation to him at the moment.
One other thought. To all you paraskavedekatraphobics out there. Today is Friday the 13th.

Showtime again

The Halle au blé, at Bourges was the venue over the weekend for the Concours International Alpagas. The main event in the alpaca show calender. A 1000km round trip. Nine animals enlisted. A pickup with a dodgy fuel pump and a two horse trailer. It wasn't an ideal scenario!
It was decided we should hire a van.
 After being let down on an animal transporter we settled on a brand new Renault Master, and because of the Easter holidays we were allowed to have it a day earlier which gave us time to install a makeshift division inside and pack all the paraphernalia into it's numerous cubby-holes and pockets.
It was just as well we had the extra day because that's about how long it took to sort it out, and even then we still couldn't comfortably get them all in.So, Blossom and Hannah would have to stay behind. That left a team of roughly half Quelvehin half Popham animals.
Normaly on this trip I would fill up four or five times there and back. So to arrive and still have a quarter tank of fuel was a bonus. These new vans are so quiet and easy to drive I am re thinking our transport requirements.
The show was short of about 40 entries on the day because of Blue Tongue restrictions forbidding any of the Belgium breeders re entry back into Belgium. But still a sizeable show although the Suri turnout was poor.
By the end of the halter classes our collective seven had bagged six first places and one fourth. Our new aquisition Cherokee Snowdrift delighted us by beating a class of eight which included the supreme champion at the Quimper show. What a little darling! But it was only Popham Ambersun Soloman who went on to win a Championship.

the show ring with Canadian judge Kristin Buhrmann

Columbus doing his 'If you touch me I'll sit down and squeal' routine

but winning his class anyway

Atlas loosing out in the black championship to a Lilyfield Jack of spades boy

Soloman wins the fawn championship

The show supreme was won by Frederick Henry with an intermediate white Huacaya male. Artemis du Fontenelle and the reserve went to Nigel and Ginny Cobb's adult white Huacaya male Arunda Lorca.

So that's it for another year as far as the show circuit goes for us. We now need to start preperations for the shearing and fleece evaluation course we holding in two weeks time. B.A.S. judge Jay Holland is doing a presentation and there is much to do.There are still a few places left if anyone is interested please get in touch. More details will be posted soon.