Soapbox time–light fawns

Non-alpaca readers, please feel free to move along, nothing to see here...

Time to be a bit controversial, pull out the soapbox and have a bit of a rant.

Caveat: Perry's personal opinion - not that of the Association and not necessarily shared by the rest of the tribe - they may agree but they're so sick of hearing me go on that they don't comment...

So, with that warning, let's talk about light-fawn alpacas (I can hear the groans from here...).

Now, we are, primarily, breeders of coloured animals: browns and fawns. We have a few nice blacks and some top whites but mostly, it's about the colours.

I like light-fawn animals, that pale shade with maybe a hint of apricot is very attractive and something that I really like to see in the herd.

I firmly believe that the show ring should reflect that...

Here's what the rules say though:

"An alpaca is to be shown in the appropriate colour class, when it is predominantly that colour. "

No problem there, agree completely, but it's immediately contradicted by:

"Animals with light fawn on the neck or backline should be entered and shown in the light fawn class."

And that's where I part company with the rules. As a result of this our light fawn classes have become a showplace for b-grade whites.

I'm terribly sorry, but if you have an animal with a pristine, snow-white fleece over 98% of its body and a tiny patch of fawn on the back of the neck, then what you have there is a, quite possibly very nice, colour-contaminated white, not a light-fawn.

And yes, I know about 'true-white' phenotypes but the truth is that they are about as common as hens' teeth and the majority of white animals shown in white classes would fail that test. As far as I'm concerned there is a stronger case for creating a new 'off-white' or 'mostly white' class than there is for shunting colour-contaminated animals in with the light fawns.

It's making a mockery of the colour classes, there have been many cases where the same animal is presented as light fawn in the ring and white in the fleece class. The public can't (with good reason) understand what they're seeing at shows and it's about time that we grew out of it and recognised light fawns for the unique class that they are rather than using the classification as a way to hoover up more ribbons for white animals that might not be able to cut it in their own class.

There, rant over. Thank you for humouring me, I feel better now and promise not to mention it again.

And so it begins...

Saturday saw the first shearing job of the season over at Strathalbyn. A gentle start to the year with 41 animals at three farms.

The way it’s looking it seems likely that we’ll clear 2000 head this year for the first time at well over 100 properties in South Australia (and a handful in NSW on the way back from a trip).

I always have mixed feelings about shearing – it’s hard work and it takes us away from the property where there’s so much to do but, on the other hand, there’s no better way to get out and about, meeting owners and seeing a huge range of animals and farming operations.

What are these things with short necks?

Sorry, couldn’t help getting all artistic…

And suddenly, we've got sheep. We never intended to have sheep, it just happened that way.

A few months ago we sold a package of female alpacas to a couple that wanted to change away from the Wiltipolls that they currently kept on their property, As part of the deal we agreed to take four pregnant ewes in part exchange.

It’s all part of our aim here to be as self sufficient as possible; while we’re certainly not eco-activists, we do care about knowing where our food comes from and how it’s raised.

So now the first two have given birth and we have spring-loaded lambs bouncing around one of the home paddocks. They do, of course have their own, personal alpaca guard – woe betide the fox that tries anything, I wouldn’t argue with her.

Got to admit that they are cute but I’m not going to get too attached – we have to remember what they’re here for.

You want them halter trained by WHEN????

We’re getting towards the tail end of the showing season here, just two more to go before shearing and mating starts in earnest.

Tomorrow is Strathalbyn Show (it’s a public holiday weekend here). Strath is one of my favourites – it’s our closest for a start, only about 40 minutes from the farm gate. It’s a great, traditional, country agricultural show, a real family event with a well supported alpaca show.

This year we’re taking a team mostly made up of juniors on their first outing. So, less than 24 hours away and guess how many have had a halter on before?

And there’s a suri to do… We like a challenge.

Compost, compost everywhere

I’ve had enough of organic fertaliser…

Look, I know it’s great for the land; I know it’s environmentally friendly and will result in sufficient good karma to reduce the chances of me being reincarnated as a sea slug or reality tv contestant but I’m fed up of eating, breathing and wearing the stuff.

Three tonnes of Neutrog Rapid-Riser and a week or so later and I can say that it was probably worth all the hard, smelly work.

But what I want to know, what I really want to know is why my younger, fitter son gets to run the slasher from the big tractor with the comfy, air-conditioned cab while I get the spreader and the 50 year old, bone-shaking MF135?

Maybe the good karma isn't working immediately...

Composite and Production Classes

An interesting development as we move ever closer to recognition as a 'proper' emerging agricultural industry is the growth of Production or Composite classes at shows.
We had our first go at the Royal Adelaide Show this year. I'd call it a success, we put in three animals, got two firsts and a second and took home the overall trophy and broad ribbon for the event.

So, for anyone unfamiliar, how does it work?
Well, judging is a three stage process. Stage one is just like normal halter classes (though, in this case, there was no separation by colour, just by age and gender), the animals presented are judged on the same overall criteria as a normal show and points are awarded. Stage two sees the animals being shorn, the fleeces skirted and presented to the judge as a fleece exhibit.

In the final stage the animal is judged without fleece on with the points being awarded for conformation and structure.
Personally, I really like these classes for three reasons: first is that it concentrates on the commercial side of things, something that I want to see encouraged. Second and, more selfishly, it allows recognition of some animals that we would not enter in the main event; in this case a top girl with a damaged ear from an injury (perfectly within the rules to enter I know, but not a good look) and an ex-champion white male that has developed a small fawn spot. The third and probably most important reason is that, at a public show like the Royal, it is such a draw card - the visitors love it.

A new sideline?

We’re heading towards the end of the show season: a fairly quiet one by our standards but still a few things to be excited about – more about that in a later post.
But here’s something I wasn’t expecting to win – Champion photo at the Nationals!

It loses a bit shrunk down to blog size…
It wasn’t a planned photograph, just one of those ‘Kodak Moments’ and a few minutes in Photoshop.
What I really wasn’t prepared for though have been the offers to buy prints. Maybe there’s something in this?
Hey! I've just noticed, this is my 100th blog posting.

Sometimes I wonder what we’re farming

It’s a very Australian problem…

One of the things that we’re quite proud of here is the preservation of native habitat. We have quite a large area of scrub and native woodland on the property; home to a range of wildlife that we’re generally very happy to share with,

But they’re beginning to take advantage. The kangaroo population is getting out of control, they know a good thing when they see it!

They’re eating us out of house and home (or, at least, paddock and pasture) and they take fences as personal insults that have to be dismantled with extreme prejudice.

Kanga-burgers anyone?

Colin’s last stand

Primarily, we’re huacaya breeders. We specialise in colours ranging from mid-fawn through to dark brown and that was originally meant to be it. But these things rarely turn out as planned and one of our excursions into the unknown has been our suri experiment. We now have nearly 50 of them on the property and they’ve been good to us. It was a suri that gave us our first interstate broad ribbon and last year we landed the Grand Champion suri trophy at the Royal Adelaide Show.

At the centre of our suri herd has been Arequipa Colin, a dark brown stud male that we purchased, on a whim, at auction.

 

Colin has done us proud but, sadly, we lost him last year to a bite from a brown snake.

A few weeks before that however he’d been less than popular. He escaped from his paddock and followed a group of girls back from matings into their paddock. We found him a couple of hours later, looking exhausted, covered in spit but with an evil, satisfied glint in his eye. That left us with a problem, there were nearly 50 girls (nearly all huacaya) in that area, most had been mated either that weekend or within the last month, some to outside males. We couldn’t possibly flush them all and we had no idea who, if any, he had mated with. We just had to wait and see and hope for the best.

We now have six first-cross suris to sell off as pets – so that was 6 successful matings inside two hours – annoying, but impressive.

Thanks Colin.

How lucky can you get?

So, there we were, a quiet Sunday morning (ok, maybe not that quiet) of matings, Most of the stud boys are waiting their turn in the shearing shed, three are out working in the yards and Colin the suri (who doesn’t play well with the other boys is round the back in the old sheep pens).

I’m just going to get another of the boys out when there are a series of cracks that sound like gunfire. James shouts ‘Get out of the shed… Run!’ So I do.. The gunshots have now turned into something that sounds more like an explosion as a 25 metre pine tree starts to fall toward us from the road outside.

It takes out one of the few new fences we have, crushes some of the pens and just misses Colin, who is currently a fairly stressed alpaca…

Thankfully, it just misses the shed and there are no injuries. Turns out that the tree has been eaten all the way through by borer beetle and its centre was largely sawdust.

As the tree was on the roadside, hopefully the council are going to come to the party to help with the damage and the clear-up.

At the moment I’m more concerned about the trees closer to the house. I think we’ll have to have them all inspected fairly quickly…

Uses for a quad bike #127

The birthing station…

Problem solved.

Sydney Royal

Something a bit different for this one…
Here I am, home alone, thinking of all the things that I should really be doing rather than sitting here typing words into this blog. Why home alone? It’s Sydney Royal Easter Show time, we’ve got babies due, we couldn’t get a farm-sitter and I either drew the short straw or the long one, I’m not sure which yet.
So, all being well, this blog will last all weekend, updating as we go along.

Thursday 28th March

7pm Home from the day-job and time to get ready for the troops to leave. Loads to do, collecting all the show support kit, gathering together the show team, running repairs on the trailer (why do we leave these things to the last moment?)
8:15pm The quad dies at about the furthest possible point from the house and sheds and has to be towed back.
9:15pm Quick break for something to eat then back to preparation – we’re bound to have forgotten something, but it looks like we’re ready.
Midnight That will do, time for bed

Good Friday, 29th March

3:15am 3:15? Really???? That’s no time for an alarm to go off in a civilised country!
Load the team up; boys in the trailer, girls in the van itself, do the last minute jobs we forgot or ran out of time for and…
4:20am The team hits the road. Google maps says that it will be just under 15 hours of travelling (without stops) and 1375km, that’s about 854 miles in old money. And to think how I used to whinge, back in the old country, about the 550 miles drive for holidays in Southwest France. Me? I’m going back to bed.
7:20am Phone call from Sarah – Road closure on the Mallee Highway “we need a new route and we’re not convinced about what the SatNav is offering” Google to the rescue again, but it’s going to add another hour and 100km to the Journey. Stuff it, I’m going back to bed again.
Later… (No, I’m not going to admit what time I got up) Morning farm stuff, bottle feed to do, water to check, quick patrol of the paddocks (not so quick without the quad though). Blog.. Self indulgence time. There are two things I actually like about being left behind for shows, first, no-one tells me to turn the volume down – currently listening to the current ‘Of Monsters and Men’ CD at a level that has the dog hiding in another room and the other indulgence is food – I love cooking and I can try things that I wouldn’t normally risk with the family. This evening will be short-rib of beef slow cooked for 8 hours with a red wine and juniper jus and pureed root veg.
12:40pm Text message from the travellers – ‘Just coming in to Balranald’ What? They must have back-tracked to get back onto the original route – that’s cost them 2 hours – According to James it took them 4.5 hours just to get out of the State.They won’t make the 8pm show deadline now. Be lucky to get there for 9. For a large part of the journey they only saw 5 other vehicles – two of them were a police car and the speeder that it had pulled.

The main road back to Balranald – at least it’s sealed

6pm and they’ve reached Wagga – 4.5 hours or thereabout to go but at least they’re through the Hay Plain. Always feels like you’ve broken the back of the journey once you’ve crossed the plain. For those of you who read this blog in Europe, let me take a moment to explain a bit about the Hay Plain. It’s big and it’s plain – that’s it really. About one person for every 5 sq km, but as most of them live in the town of Hay, it’s pretty empty out there. Crossing it on a previous trip I stopped and took this picture (a 180 degree panorama) because I was so excited to see a tree…

It’s only a bit over 200km across but boring doesn’t come close… BBC radio podcasts and audiobooks help to maintain sanity.
Meanwhile, back at mission control I’m being a good little house husband, domestic stuff and a bit of fishing. Yes, we’ve been here since October, there’s lots of water and it’s been driving me mad that I’ve not had time to drop a hook into any of the dams.So, this evening, I made time and can confirm that we have fish – I didn’t manage to land anything so can’t say what they are, but I can, at least, now imagine the one that got away.
8pm They’ve made Yass – now the difficult stuff starts as it gets dark. It’s looking like an 11pm arrival – I hope someone is there to let them in to showground, turns out that they could not have booked in until tomorrow morning anyway – should have double-checked.
11:30pm The good news is that they have arrived at the Showground, the bad news is that security won’t let them in. Looks like they might have to sleep in the van – bearable for people but getting a bit much for the animals. I feel a letter coming on…

Saturday 30th March

00:40am Someone has relented and let them in. I look forward to hearing what form the negotiations took.
7am Looks like they had to wake the convenor up to get in, that’s not good. But they’re sorted now and getting ready for the judging to start tomorrow.
A bit about Sydney Royal for those that don’t know it. Pretty much everyone would agree that this is the country’s second most prestigious show. After the Nationals, a ribbon from Sydney is the greatest accolade you can get. Classes are big and competition is tough, it’s the first really big show of the year and it gives some idea of how the show year is going to pan out. Unusually, it’s a show where you get to stay in the pavilion, each row of pens has a large plywood box at the end. It’s these boxes that are your home for the next 5 nights.

5-Star Accommodation

Midday And, just in case I forgot why we decided to leave me behind to mind the farm…

To Beatrice and Puck, a solid black boy – now that could be an exciting mix.
And the quad works again – I’m not one of nature’s natural mechanics – I do computers, not engines, so I’m feeling pretty smug at the moment.
Now it’s spit-offs and matings time… What fun!

Sunday 31st March

4:30pm A quiet start, we only sent one Junior so that’s the only activity today. Belalie is a pretty special mid/dark fawn girl. It’s a big tough class and she gets a second. No one goes looking for a second, but it’s actually a good result – it’s her third outing and her third second place to a Softfoot animal with very similar genetics who then goes on to win a broad ribbon. It’s quite possible that she’s currently one of the top three in the country in her class. Apparently it was a line call with the judges taking a long time to make the decision between the two of them – the Softfoot animal then went on to win res junior champ.
Back at home it’s all boring stuff – I’ve had to be content with spending most of the day wiring in the loft.

And then there were sheep…

So, there we are, we’ve got the shed nicely set up for alpacas, we’ve got a workflow that, while not perfect, is getting better and we’re well past the halfway mark.

Then we get a call – “Is it OK to shear 400 merinos in your shed next week?”

Seems that there has been a long-standing arrangement with the previous owner where they rented out the shed to a local sheep farmer.

OK, not too much of a problem and with the bills we’re getting just to get the plumbing working, every dollar is welcome.

So.. out comes the table again. Let me pause here a moment gentle reader to talk about the space under the shed where I have to go to take out the bolts…

Like all shearing sheds, it’s built on legs with a crawl space underneath. A crawl space filled with  20 years of sheep …., at least half of South Australia’s venomous spider population, a possum and a snake or two (I’ve not met one under there yet – but they’re there, I’m sure that they’re there). Let’s put it this way, it’s not my happy place.

Anyway it’s done and we have sheep shearing going on

There is a plus side. In one corner of the shed there is an old (read very old) wool press. It looks lethal and would certainly like nothing more than to chomp down one or two of my fingers. I’d assumed that it was not serviceable and only really fit for scrap but, apparently they use it every year and, while undoubtedly something that would make a safety inspector need to go and lay down in darkened room, it still works perfectly. So, part of the charge for the use of the shed is a quick course in how the thing works.

That happens tomorrow. If I have any fingers left, I’ll tell you about it.

Settling in and shearing

One of the great things about the new place is that it has a shearing shed. For the last 5 years we’ve been shearing in the open or under canvas.

Of course, nothing is simple so one of the first challenges is to convert the existing two-stand sheep operation for alpacas

We’d have liked to have used the existing shearing plant, but we’ll save that for next year – rigid bar fittings may be fine for sheep but are no good for ‘pacas. So this year we’re sticking to our electric handpieces.

Table bolted to the floor and ready to go

Come the first morning for shearing and another great step forward – runways. We’ve never had proper runways before, we’ve always had to lead the animals into pens a few at a time or use the old maternity paddock with its catching area. Things are now on a much bigger scale with the main girl’s paddock nearly a kilometre away. Possibly taking photos while riding the quad is not something to recommend…

They soon learn what the runways are for..

I’d like to be able to say that we got through them all on the first weekend but there was a lot to learn with the new setup and we barely averaged 4 per hour in the first session, but we’re getting there.

Having friends to help makes a big difference – so does a well stocked drinks fridge

35 degrees wasn’t big help either, but we’re most of the way through now.

Well… We made it.

Hard to believe that the move was a week ago. It goes without saying that it was a couple of days of unmitigated hell and that we’re still living out of boxes (and will probably continue to do so for months).

But we’re here and ready to start our new life.

One of the first loads leaves Meadows

But there is no way that we could have done it on our own so indulge me a moment while I acknowledge a few people from the alpaca industry who helped to make this possible:

Rosalie Brinkworth from Andean Gold Alpacas who put so much into helping us to get packed and organised.

Susan Haese from Yaringa Alpacas who helped move animals and arrived with a home cooked meal on Thursday night

Fred & Bernadette Duncker from Glenvois Alpaca who helped with animals

And last, but by no mean least, Chris Williams from Ambersun. Chris helped us move tonnes of plants and equipment, he sorted out our water and he gave us a roof over our heads and hot showers on our first night. Most of all, it was Chris who probably kept us sane..

As for the Alpacas… They could not be happier

Heading off into the sunset to explore their huge new home

60% done with 80% to go…

At least, that’s what it feels like.
We don’t actually exchange formally until Thursday, but, as the new place is empty, we have a ‘licence to occupy’ which means that we’ve spent the last 3 days (a long weekend here in South Australia) starting the move.
We’ve never moved farm before. It’s a bit more complex than moving house isn’t it? All that equipment, the workshop, the tools etc. Strangely, the alpacas are turning out to be the easy part; that’s one of the great things about this business – a real sense of community, everyone mucks in to help.
Vet inspection today, a bit nervous about that. We’re part of the Q-Alpaca program, a national bio-security scheme. As the new place has been used for cattle and sheep in the recent past the inspection has to be thorough (and probably expensive).
Anyway, here’s a sneak preview
 
The top dam. One of four large wet areas and home to yabbies and marron

Really looking forward to seeing alpacas grazing over those hills
So, land? 10 out of 10.
House and shedding? That’s another story…

Moving on…

There comes a time when you have to decide just how committed to something you actually are. To put your money where your mouth is, to grasp the nettle and to fearlessly use any number of other tired business clichés.

For a long time now I’ve been preaching the gospel about an emerging alpaca industry in Australia; about maturing from a niche market, selling high-value collectables and pets, into a viable and sustainable agricultural business.

While saying this though, we’ve been the picture of the established small alpaca business. A little over 100 animals; overstocked, small plot of land; concentration on shows and small volume sales and only a side interest in ‘the product’.

On October 4th, the game changes. We’ve sold the farm and have brought ‘Red Bank Springs’, a much larger property, currently running sheep and cattle in Hindmarsh Valley.

It’s going to take a fair few years to build up what we would consider to be a commercial herd, but we’re up for the challenge.

Of course, moving at the same time as trying to organise the National Show an Sale is probably not such a good idea…

Cricket fans

We couldn’t resist snapping this one…

Schnuffles is one very sick boy, we thought we’d lost him at the weekend when a visitor told us we had a dead cria in the paddock. But he’s a fighter and, while he’s far from healthy, he’s hanging on in there and seems to be enjoying a few days inside in the warm.

Gandhi, of course is the perfect pooch and has taken well to his new role as babysitter.

They both seem to love sport and children’s shows on the TV.

I’ve often wondered why so many farmers have missing fingers…

 

It wasn’t until after I’d finished the job that I started to think about how, maybe, this could have been done in a safer way…

Some figures from Safework Australia:

27 accidents per year for each 1000 agricultural workers – multiply that up and, according to Safework, there are more than a dozen reportable work accidents in the sector per day

It’s a dangerous business we’re in.

Busy busy busy

Just a quick entry to let folks know why things are so quiet here…

Team Prados is convening the 2012 National Show and Sale – A huge job that leaves little time for things like updating this little blog.

That doesn’t mean that we’re completely off the air though.

Keep up with us on the National Show Blog and at the national website

Hopefully the Alpaca Chatter blog will be back online in October