Skinny Girls
June 30th 2008 03:40
I’ve decided to wean Emily off Alice. Emily’s six months old now and she’s a big girl, so well and truly able to survive without her mum now.
I often let the girls wean their female crias themselves, as I’ve found some will do it anyway, when the crias about 9 months old. They’ll walk away when the cria tries to nurse, or nudge the cria away with their back leg.
Some mum’s lose a lot of condition when they’re nursing and it doesn’t seem to matter how much extra food you shovel into them, it just goes straight through to the baby. Alice is starting to get a bit skinny this year, so I’ve moved her up to the house paddock with Fiona, Donald’s mum.
Fiona hasn’t lost a lot of condition, but she’s the skinniest of the other mums and I always prefer to keep at least two alpacas together. Donald is 6 months old and also ready to be weaned now, so that’s worked out well. I’ve moved him in with the boys and put them way down the back where he can’t see his mum.
I’ve moved Emily and the rest of the girls to a paddock which is a fair distance away and has super good fences - Em went through the ordinary five strand fence twice, just as Marco did (that’s the next fence to be fixed properly!).
It’s not so good that Emily can still see her mum from the corner of her paddock. She’s been running up and down the fence looking for a way to get through to her. It would be much better if they couldn’t see each other, but if you don’t have many “far away” paddocks, you need to cope with what you have.
Alice and Fiona are concerned about being separated from the main herd. I’ve found they don’t worry much about their crias going away, but they don’t like to separated from the main group (a safety in numbers thing, I would guess).
They’ve got access to a bit of longer grass though, which will give them more nutrition than the really short stuff in all the other paddocks. I’ve been giving them some extra food as well, a mix of lucerne and oaten chaff, and gran mix which is a horse feed containing various grains, chaff and molasses. The alpacas love it.
I don’t want to keep the two mums separate from the main herd too long so giving them extra will help get some weight back onto Alice fairly quickly now she's not feeding Emily. It will also take their minds off being away from the herd.
Her milk will dry up fairly soon too. So (hopefully), when I put them back in with the herd, she won’t let Emily nurse anymore.
That’s the plan anyway.
Emily
I often let the girls wean their female crias themselves, as I’ve found some will do it anyway, when the crias about 9 months old. They’ll walk away when the cria tries to nurse, or nudge the cria away with their back leg.
Some mum’s lose a lot of condition when they’re nursing and it doesn’t seem to matter how much extra food you shovel into them, it just goes straight through to the baby. Alice is starting to get a bit skinny this year, so I’ve moved her up to the house paddock with Fiona, Donald’s mum.
Fiona hasn’t lost a lot of condition, but she’s the skinniest of the other mums and I always prefer to keep at least two alpacas together. Donald is 6 months old and also ready to be weaned now, so that’s worked out well. I’ve moved him in with the boys and put them way down the back where he can’t see his mum.
I’ve moved Emily and the rest of the girls to a paddock which is a fair distance away and has super good fences - Em went through the ordinary five strand fence twice, just as Marco did (that’s the next fence to be fixed properly!).
It’s not so good that Emily can still see her mum from the corner of her paddock. She’s been running up and down the fence looking for a way to get through to her. It would be much better if they couldn’t see each other, but if you don’t have many “far away” paddocks, you need to cope with what you have.
Alice and Fiona in the garden
Alice and Fiona are concerned about being separated from the main herd. I’ve found they don’t worry much about their crias going away, but they don’t like to separated from the main group (a safety in numbers thing, I would guess).
They’ve got access to a bit of longer grass though, which will give them more nutrition than the really short stuff in all the other paddocks. I’ve been giving them some extra food as well, a mix of lucerne and oaten chaff, and gran mix which is a horse feed containing various grains, chaff and molasses. The alpacas love it.
I don’t want to keep the two mums separate from the main herd too long so giving them extra will help get some weight back onto Alice fairly quickly now she's not feeding Emily. It will also take their minds off being away from the herd.
Her milk will dry up fairly soon too. So (hopefully), when I put them back in with the herd, she won’t let Emily nurse anymore.
That’s the plan anyway.
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Comment by katyzzz
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Comment by Rosemary
Alpaca Notes - Tasmania
Frankly, watching the news lately, you gotta wonder why some people bother having children at all.
Alpacas, much easier