Good Design from Nature
August 20th 2007 01:08
One great thing about alpacas is they are born clean skinned around the tail and belly areas and the fleece on the insides of their legs stays very short.
Because of this they are not prone to flystrike. They also come complete with a short tail which is never docked. Their tails makes great fly swatters and play an important part in their communication with other alpacas.
For example, a female who is receptive to mating will wave her tail around at a male letting him know that she is interested. Young alpacas show submission to an older one by flipping their tail up over their back.
Alpacas tend to keep themselves clean around the back end, without any intervention from us, so there is no need for the crutching or mulesing that is carried out on some sheep breeds.
This is a fabulous design from nature, and just another reason to have alpacas (as if there weren't enough already). I am truly hoping that alpaca breeders won't sacrifice this great feature in the quest to get more fibre from their alpacas.
There is a trend in Australia currently to breed alpacas with woolly faces. In my opinion, this appears to be simply for visual appeal, rather than to serve any useful purpose. The fleece around the face is pretty short so isn’t very valuable commercially.
We have a couple of alpacas with, what I call, 'Teddy Bear' faces. They are incredibly cute looking animals, that’s for sure, but I often wonder if all that fleece around their heads affects their vision. I have on occasion given them a haircut to make sure they can see where they’re going.
These alpacas point their heads up as they look at you which adds to their cuteness and appeal, but also indicates to me that perhaps they don’t have the same range of vision as their clean faced friends. They seem happy enough though and I haven’t seen them bumping into the fences so I guess they adapt.
No mulesing required
Because of this they are not prone to flystrike. They also come complete with a short tail which is never docked. Their tails makes great fly swatters and play an important part in their communication with other alpacas.
For example, a female who is receptive to mating will wave her tail around at a male letting him know that she is interested. Young alpacas show submission to an older one by flipping their tail up over their back.
Alpacas tend to keep themselves clean around the back end, without any intervention from us, so there is no need for the crutching or mulesing that is carried out on some sheep breeds.
This is a fabulous design from nature, and just another reason to have alpacas (as if there weren't enough already). I am truly hoping that alpaca breeders won't sacrifice this great feature in the quest to get more fibre from their alpacas.
There is a trend in Australia currently to breed alpacas with woolly faces. In my opinion, this appears to be simply for visual appeal, rather than to serve any useful purpose. The fleece around the face is pretty short so isn’t very valuable commercially.
We have a couple of alpacas with, what I call, 'Teddy Bear' faces. They are incredibly cute looking animals, that’s for sure, but I often wonder if all that fleece around their heads affects their vision. I have on occasion given them a haircut to make sure they can see where they’re going.
These alpacas point their heads up as they look at you which adds to their cuteness and appeal, but also indicates to me that perhaps they don’t have the same range of vision as their clean faced friends. They seem happy enough though and I haven’t seen them bumping into the fences so I guess they adapt.
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Comment by katyzzz
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Thanks for another interesting post.
katyzzz
Comment by Rosemary
Alpaca Notes - Tasmania
I am attached to some of my alpacas and not others. Sometimes I decide I need to sell some and put them up for sale. I don't think about it much at the time, but then when someone puts a deposit down, I suddenly feel very sad that he or she will be going away.
Cheers
Rosemary