I spent this past Thursday at Gnomewood Farm near Covington, LA. I went to help and to learn. It was a great day! I’m so glad I went because I probably would cry when I see the first one of ours post shearing if I hadn’t seen it first. Our boys are due to be shorn either April 8th or 9th.
Here is part of the herd waiting for their turn. There was a lot of humming going on that day. One of the times they hum is when they’re nervous about something.
The alpaca in front is gorgeous. He has the most beautiful grey fleece and an amazing coloring down the back of his neck.
“Let’s blow this joint”
They look so fat and fluffy with all that fleece. Check out that sock over his nose & mouth. Know what that’s for? He’s a spitter. :-)
“The Spitter”
He may be a spitter, but he’s gorgeous! Oh, but look at him after being shorn.
Elmer is the guy doing the shearing. He’s from Iowa and travels all over to shear sheep, alpacas, and llamas. He carries this corral or chute or whatever you want to call it. It contains the animal while the shearing is being done.
This is Zorro. He was huge with all his fleece.
He looked like a linebacker before Elmer did his magic.
Yikes! What have you done to me?
All their white alpacas have blue eyes. It’s called “BEW” for ”Blue Eyed White” and I still need to do some more research on it. All my whites have brown eyes. I just love these blue ones!
Before shearing
After!!! That’s Noel behind the paca. She is one of the owners of the farm.
A couple more pictures of magnificent alpacas.
The shearing process yields 2 different cuts of fleece. This is the “blanket” being shorn. The legs, neck, and belly are called “seconds” because the fiber is shorter and not as fine. With 21 alpacas done that day, there was a lot of fleece collected.
Beautiful gray fleece
I’m looking forward to seeing what we get from our boys.
