Alpaca Farmgirl

Saturday morning, while I was at an alpaca show, Judy decided to have her cria. Early in the morning. When it was very cold. When our farm manager, Jeremy, arrived, he found this little guy with purple ears and his tongue lolling out of the side of his mouth. The baby was almost lifeless.

Jeremy is not the type of to allow a cria to die on his watch, so he blow dried him and got him warmed up. The baby began to show more life. As he warmed him, the cria would sometimes give in to his weakness and his head would droop. “HECK no.” Jeremy told him and brought him around again. The first day he was bottle fed goat colostrum (alpacas almost never have extra colostrum to freeze). This is his mom’s first experience with having a cria to nurse and she took some convincing.  But by Sunday afternoon, the little guy was up and nursing.

Born weighing only 9 and 1/2 pounds (12 lbs. and under is considered at risk), we really didn’t expect this cria to be doing so well. Today he is at 10 and 1/2 lbs, and he’s running around, healthy as can be! The kids and I have come up with some possible names for him. We have a poll on Alpaca Farmgirl where you can vote for which name you think we should choose. Vote here.