Thursday 15 August 2013

Another double header!

Yesterday was another double header here in Patouland as both Dilly and Skye decided to unpack.
First at about 9.30am Dilly dropped out a lovely big healthy grey male. This is excellent news, Qjori who has grey parents always had the potential to pop out a grey and last year he produced Todd out of Alice, our other white female. Dilly's cria is more of a textbook grey with all the correct markings in the right places. Last year we thought Todd was brown with a white face, it was only after a couple of months that the grey came through. Well no doubt about this boy, he is grey!
We are very pleased with him, he was a whopper at 10.55kg and had been baked for 352 days. We have named him Vickery.


No he isn't a three legged alpaca, he does have four!


He is a real live wire and is constantly charging around in the field, he seems to love to run, just like me.


A few hours later we realised that Skye was up to something. She had taken herself off into the shed and was looking uncomfortable. Now this is where it gets all weird. Skye was quite obviously pushing. She was definitely in labour and she was trying to have a baby. After a while with nothing progressing we decided to have a feel. Well when I say we, I mean Sue, she is a midwife afterall! So Sue got gloved and lubed up and 'went in' , although she couldn't. She could only get two fingers in. She could feel the top of a head but the, erm, hole, wasn't big enough. This was worrying and Sue went off to phone the vet whilst I stayed with Skye.
Then followed what I can only describe as the most painfull, uncomfortable looking chain of events. Skye was straining for all her worth, her back end was bulging out so far that I could see the shape of a whole head but there was no hole for it to come out of. It took seemingly ages but eventually, by some miracle of nature a nose, then a head and two feet appeared. Skye was knackered.
After a little rest Sue gently eased out the cria and all was well. A strapping big brown Qjori boy weighing in at 8.55kg. Strong and healthy and soon up and feeding. I still do not know how he managed to get out it really was like something from a horror film as far as I was concerned.
I had to shoot off to work so have only seen him up close this morning and I have to say he is a very smart young fellow with a very pretty fleece. Skye is a Collabear Albert girl so I think this Qjori/Albert mix has great potential.


 Whilst I was looking at the new brown boy who I have named Willoughby (I have done this on my own so this may be pooh poohed by the rest of the naming committee) a white and grey missile arrived on the scene quickly followed by his mother who is constantly struggling to keep up with him!


We now have one female left to give birth. Sahara, who is Dilly's daughter is now 349 days in to her pregnancy and looks ready to split! Don't you just love it all!

3 comments:

Unknown said...

What great looking cria Mark...I think I could be tempted to have dabble on the grey side soon!

Apple Vale Alpacas said...

Lovely grey, and at least you'll have no trouble recognizing him.

Zanzibah Alpacas said...

Congratulations .. just goes to show, you don't have to be brown to be Mighty !! ..... Jayne