Alpacas

Last Wednesday we took the alpacas to a place north of Flagstaff. The donor program is run by Christians. They will work with the alpacas & place them with the appropriate person or family. I am encouraged and impressed by what I saw there. It took 3 trailers to get them there and it was for sure a long trip. But it was accomplished. Very long & tiring 2 days.

I am missing them some & look for them still when I go out. I also find myself grieving again for Dennis. The alpacas were his in the sense of he is who wanted them, picked many of them & helped deliver some of the cria. He is the one that took the classes. I learned all I could on line, but he was more of the hands on.

In many ways I am sorry to see them gone, but in many other ways it is a relief to not have them any more. Very mixed feelings....................

The Farm

As I stated in my previous post, the last 8 months have been something else. Due to all that has been going on and the economy I knew I needed to downsize with the alpacas. Then during shearing time I also had a broken ankle. Luckily not a serious break, but still broken & in a boot. I got hit in the jaw by one of the alpaca boys & decided that I seriously needed to make some changes. I have managed to find a place to donate the alpacas to & they will end up with people in the Navajo nation.

I have a special spot in my heart for the Navajo people due to my Aunt & Uncle being missionaries to them for many many years. So I feel good about this. They are still with me at this point, but hopefully we will be moving them in about 2 or 3 weeks. In many ways it will be a relief to have one less grouping to worry about & that ties me down. I will miss them though.

Blue is deaf

Yesterday was the Valley Fiber Art Guild meeting/get together here. A number of the ladies wanted to go out & see the cria that are learning to live away from mama. When we got into the corral 5 of the cria ran over to check everyone out. I got out some alfafa to feed them. Suddenly I noticed that Blue (the blue eyed white guy) wan't with them. So I went over to the loafing shed to check out why. He had his head way down in the hay manger that I have for them. I stood to his side & said, "Blue". No response. So I started yelling his name & clapping my hands. He just kept eating.

Dennis & I had debated ever since he was born if he was deaf or not. I had decided he had partial hearing at least. But they pick up so many clues from each other, looking & observing. I've heard from friends that it is really hard to tell. Well, now we know that he is. I reached over & touched him & he jumped & took off. He seemed disoriented for a while probably because no friends were with him. Then he came over & ate with everyone else.

Now Sadie, who is a blue eyed white also & the mother of Freckles ------- I still don't know if she is deaf or not. I've not been able to catch her in a position alone where I could test her.

But for sure Blue is. I'm thankful that he isn't like our friend Janet, who has a BEW (blue eyed white) female who hums continually & loudly. Blue does hum.

Today is windy, windy although the sun is out & shinning. I'm tired, not sleeping well last night. Have a class at church today. Had a great day yesterday with all the fiber art people!!!

God is good.

Cria weaning

Today became the day to separate the cria from their mom's. I ask our neighbors to help because I wanted to take them two at a time. I've learned from times past that it is better to have the cria out of sight of their moms. So we had to take them all the way across one field, through the front yard, across the driveway yard area & into the barn corral. Such fun. Willie & I ended up with two that decided to lay down & refused to move. But we got all 6 of them over to the new area. I need to start working for sure with the females & haltering, etc. Perhaps returning them to the rest of the females in a month will be a lot easier!! So far all the moms seem to be doing well & not that upset. Hopefully the cria will do well also.

I've finished my mom's taxes & they are ready to mail off. I now need to start mine. Dennis' estate is becoming more understandable & I know where I am headed on that. So it's uphill now. Of course there is still the rabbits that need to be sheared!! AND the weather is beautiful right now.

God is good.

Other name ideas

Name ideas from a friend on my First Place group:

Reminded me of Batman and Robin here is some names that come to mind
Homes & Watson
Tina & Ike
Sonny & Cher
Bert & Ernie
Wanda & Margaret
Leverne & Shirley
Bubble & Squeek
Sylvester & Tweetie
The Lone Rnger &Tonto
Pixie & Dixie
Lois Lane & Superman
Garfield & Odie
Hansel & Gretel
Kermit & Piggy

A number will have to be tossed out since I don't think either guy would like to be called a girls name!!

The twins

Ok, I've been meaning to post pictures of our two cria who look so much alike, they could almost be twins. It is most interesting.................the only common relative they have is a grandmother, as Ghost is both Fawndew's mom & Cookie's mom.............their father's are not related at all.

I'm going to post a couple of pictures. We are of course in need of some sort of names........Mutt & Jeff? Twiddle de dee & Twiddle de dum..............on & on my thoughts go..........trying to get something good in the way of names. So I guess we are open to names for the guys. Both are boys.

Fawndew's cria is lighter in color than Cookie's cria. They both have a little brown around the mouth area. If they were the same color it would be hard to tell them apart.

Fawndew on Saturday

It is really hard figuring out how much to supplement and how to keep milk coming in from Mom. For us it is impossible to spend time milking mom just because of everything else going on this week. Thursday baby lost weight again AND of course I had my appt. in Colorado Springs. But Fawndew was better, so you want baby to nurse more & increase milk production. He did get supplemented 4 times Thursday, and Friday gained weight. Friday we supplemented 3 times and this morning baby had gained over a pound. Mom still has milk & he is still nursing. Mom's bag feels pretty normal now. So we'll see, maybe supplement twice today, or three time smaller amounts.....................................I think perhaps we are on more of an uphill trend here.

Fawndew on Tuesday

She seems better. Baby is still trying to nurse, so that is good. PLUS he is up beyond his birth weight finally (it's hard when the poor cria's parents are such DUH parents!!! ---- Pastor Bruce I still love that sermon)......................

Anyway things are moving along. I was told this poor baby needs a name despirately & that is probably true. But he has a "friend" born a week after he was born that looks almost exactly like him, only darker fiber --- markings are almost exactly alike.................hopefully soon I'll be able to post pictures of both & open things up for suggestions for names.....................

Poor Fawndew & baby

It has taken us a day or two to figure things out, mostly since our animals are in the field most of the time................so to trap them to check something out takes some work.

We knew Fawndew's cria hadn't been gaining weight like he should have. Yesterday we managed to check things out. Fawndew has a mastitis in a portion of her bag, so far I think just 1 teat. We massaged & did some hot packs but today we have started antibiotics & pain relievers (although it doesn't seem to be sore & she doesn't act sick). But we are hoping this will work & open her milk supply so that we do not have to totally feed the cria. Don't need that on top of everything else.

We are just supplementing now & the baby is still attempting to nurse as much as he can. So we'll see how it goes. I guess Fawndew can use some prayers now too!!

Cookie's cria

Cria # 5

Well, surprise, surprise, Fawndew wasn't acting right this morning. Sure enough she was in labor. She was due either Aug. 4th or perhaps Aug. 29th...........so I guess Aug. 13 is right in the middle & must be perfect. A pretty little boy, brown with a white spot. Looks a lot like Sadie's boy. One leg back, so intervention needed............................She is/was a maiden, so we'll see how she does.

Pictures to follow.

The new baby info

Well, I haven't figured out how to post pictures below each other, so the writing was all messed up that I put in with the pictures.

This is our latest born today at 12:40 pm with some help from Dennis. Sadie (the mom) had a stillborn with her first birth 3 yrs. ago. So everyone is happy with a live good looking boy!!

Weighed in at 19 pounds 14 oz. Up & running in about an hour.

It's a BOY!!

The last 24 + hours have been very busy. Our new girl wasn't sucking real well & had lost a fair amount of weight. We finally supplemented her. She had a good suck. I weighed her last night & she hadn't lost any weight. This morning she had gained close to a pound ----- so during the night she figured things out!!