A visit to Westhill Alpacas

After many attempts at meeting up with Rosemary, Carl and Sam at Westhill Alpacas, we finally made it! Following a somewhat lengthy drive (exacerbated by far too much traffic!!), we arrived at Ibberton Hill in Blandford despite some dodgy instructions from the Sat Nav!! What greeted us (apart from Sam standing in the road to ensure that we didn't drive past) was a view from Westhill Alpacas across to Ibberton which can only be descibed as "stupendous"!

Rosemary and Carl made us feel very welcomed and before we had a walk around their farm, we sat down for a general chat around Alpacas accompanied by coffee, biscuits and cake. We then had a wonderful tour around their Alpaca farm and both Sheila and I were so impressed with the layout and the work that had clearly gone into it! (great fencing Carl!). This was followed by introductions to the Alpacas and what struck us was that they were so friendly!!

Afterwards, we sat down for another coffee and biscuits and Sheila and Rosemary had a chat about Alpaca fibre and knitting garments. Sadly, our visit came to an end and we were soon back on the road to Easter-Wood. Thank you again Rosemary, Carl and Sam for a lovely afternoon.

 The WestHill and Easter-Wood teams

This weekend, we have a busy schedule of Dectomax injections for the youngsters. As they are much easier to handle than their adult counterparts, we should be able to complete this job fairly quickly (famous last words I hear you say!!).

Next week, we are looking forward to having my Grandaughter, Emma over for a few days. Last time Emma was here she was at the birth of Easter-Wood Moon Dance whom she subsequently named and we are looking forward to showing her how she has grown!

I had better close now as I have just remembered that I haven't given some of our Alpacas their daily ration of hay and I had better do this before it gets too dark!!

Catch up time at Wellground

With a hasty clean up of the barn and a check of our Alpacas this morning, we set off for a visit to the Wellground Stud to catch up with Rob and Les. With their (relatively) recent purchase of a wood burning stove, we had promised them some kindling wood left over from our Cabin build so armed with a couple of sacks, we duly delivered the aforementioned items!

It was great to catch up with Rob & Les again and no sooner had we arrived, the traditional "kenco" had been offered and greatfully accepted. Following a general chat about all things Alpaca, we set off for a good "fleece rummage". All I can say is.......Fantastic quality!! But how do you keep the Alpacas so clean Rob??

To cap off a thoroughly enjoyable visit, Rob & Les then provided us with a "home made" pizza and chips.....we were so spoilt.

First thing tomorrow, I will have to get the shampoo out to give our herd the "Wellground look".

See you again soon.

Fleece test results

Just a short blog tonight as I am cooking dinner!............ We finally received our test results back from Yocom McColl and are delighted with the figures. We sent off samples from the first cut of our Elite yearlings in May and we are really pleased that we had two at 15 micron and two at 17 micron.

Since the weather had improved drastically today, my first priority was to do a major poo-picking exercise on all of the paddocks but before I started, I went out early this morning with the camera to capture a few more images of the youngsters so here are a few, which I hope you will enjoy:

This is Pandora, a female from Cambridge Ice Cool Lad

This is Champagne Charlie on the left (a light fawn) and Cadbury on the right, both from Cambridge Ice Cool Lad

 This is another of Leia at 7 weeks from Wellground Close Encounter

 This is Diego at 2 months from EP Cambridge Samson

Be back soon.

The latest at Easter-Wood...

Over the last two weeks, a lot has happened and here's a summary:

• We've had five new cria
• Dismantled and re-assembled our shed
• Had a golfing break.
• Employed the last of our agricultural students for a two week work experience
• Entertained half a dozen visitors
• Managed to remove a vast amount of Ragwort
• Reluctantly removed our beloved shipping container

Cambridge Ice Cool Lad continues to produce great quality cria and we have now had another 5 of his progeny of which a couple are shown below:

This is Caspar, a solid white male at 70 minutes old! 

A new-born, light brown female called Cadbury with mum, Sheila and our work experience student looking on

Both of these cria were born within 45 minutes of each other giving Sheila and Kym (our work experience student) a real treat.

Neil, my son came down last week to help me dismantle a storage shed which for some reason was not approved by the local council when we applied for planning! Anyway it was a job that had been delayed because of the time it has taken to finish the log cabin and now that is out of the way, it is another job that I can tick off my ever-growing list of priorities!

Last weekend, I had a break from the building project that has been going on since early March and went off to Devon with a few colleagues to indulge in golf! It was great to get back to playing again after a break of nearly two years bringing about a real mix of good and bad golf. We had a fabulous time with pretty good weather except Sunday afternoon when it "lashed down (see picture!!)

Yours truly in the middle and despite the weather, we don't look too unhappy!

The local Agricultural College asked us earlier this year if we could provide work experience for some of their students during the summer and as a result, we have had two very helpful girls working with us throughout June and July. I've got to say that help with poo picking is really useful!!

Running our Alpaca farm here in Wokingham has generated much interest and as a result, we have entertained a number of visitors during the last couple of months. It is always a delight to see the effect that Alpacas have on people who have never seen them up close! What with the number of youngsters we have had this year, it is no surprise that people fall in love with them.

It never ceases to amaze me why Ragwort appears to grow overnight!! No sooner than I have cleared a paddock of this weed, that it appears the following day!! Anyway, armed with my weed-removing tool, I had a "blitz" on all of the paddocks last week. As the weather has been very dry for some time now (except today however!!) it remains to be seen if this was effective or not!

Yesterday saw our beloved shipping container leaving us. As a result of the local council's demands (again), we have had it shipped off our farm. It was housing much of our furniture, so now we have now finally moved into the cabin, it had to go!

I will post some pictures of our recent "batch" of cria on the next blog in the meantime, bye for now.