Aisling of Les Fragnes

Windermere Lady Coulemelle gave birth to beautiful little Aisling on 20 November 2009. Isn't she amazing!

Seamus's new friend

Here is Seamus with a new friend, one of our visitors this summer.
The boys are having a busy time, with lots of treks at the moment. And Amélie is settling in very well. She's much braver than she used to be and has been accepted as one of the herd by our girls.

Meet Amélie

Here is Amélie the alpaca. She joined us from Alapgas de la Tille in Cote d'Or. She is settling in very well, and enjoys spending time in her 'boudoir', as you can see in this photo.

Half cut alpacas

It turned very hot this week so it was time to clip the alpacas thick wool. They weren't overly impressed so it took several sessions to get it completely finished. Here is Seamus halfway through:
And here's a finished Brendan - a little scary, but not too bad. I'm sure I'll get better at it!

Lulin, the boss

Little Lulin, our llama cria who is two months old, is the boss of our two alpacas. She's the ringleader. They'll often follow her round the field and put up with trying to eat their neckerchieves.

Nuzzle and Scratch

Seamus and Brendan bear an uncanny resemblance to Nuzzle and Scratch, stars of Cbeebies! We love this programme, even though there are a few technical inaccuracies ie in their song they say that they 'have hooves instead of handies'! (Alpacas have toes with nails.) Go to www.bbc.co.uk/cbeebies/nuzzleandscratch/ to find out all about them.
The photo above is from the BBC website.

Boys outside

We finally finished the new field so Brendan and Seamus now spend every day outside with Gabby and baby llama Lulin. They get on well. Lulin is rather naughty - she often bites the boys' neckerchiefs and has even jumped over Seamus once when he was cushed on the ground!
They boys did their first trek on April 8th with the Howell family from England. They did excellently and made a very good impression on the trekkers.
Here's a super pic of Caitlin with the boys.

Bounding ahead

The alpacas have come on in leaps and bounds! They now love to go for walks and are very well behaved on their leads. It's been much easier to train them than I ever imagined. Here are a couple of nice photos of them with Caitlin and me on our last trek.
And some news on the halter front. The reason my order from Rocky Mount Llamas didn't arrive is that they had a huge fire there in early January. No human or camelid casualties, thank goodness, just the computer. But they are up and running again and the halters will be here soon. So the alpacas will have another red and blue halter each, and Gabby and Windy will have some super smart llama halters too.

Seamus at the door

Here's a nice photo of Seamus. He and Brendan are still quite nervous of going through doors!

Halters here

The alpaca's halters have finally arrived, not from Rocky Mt Llamas - no idea what has happened to that order, but from Christiane Giudicelli here in France. So Seamus now has a lovely blue halter and leading rope to go with his blue bandana, and Brendan has a red outfit. The two boys aren't particualarly bothered by their halters. I've slipped them over their noses while distracting them with tasty titbtis. They didn't bat an eyelid. I'll do that a few more times and then we'll take them off for a walk to make a serious start on their training.

Fab fabric

I have just bought the most beautiful fabric off ebay (from blanmo2005 to be exact). I have a yard each of black, white and blue alpaca pattern fabric. A photo will follow very soon. What am I going to do with it? Well, I have been planning on making all the llamas a bandana each. The two alpacas already have them and they look super. But this fabric's too nice for llamas! Caiti and I will have to get busy with some nice girlie things like scrunchies and little bags. Suggestions welcome please!

What do you get ...

What do you get if you cross a llama with an alpaca. A huarizo - and apologies if you were expecting a witty punchline. Specifically a huarizo is a cross between a male llama and a female alpaca. They are renowned for having wonderful quality wool and apparently make nice pets. They are usually sterile.
I haven’t managed to find out what a male alpaca / female llama cross is called. I’m sure they must exist. Do let me know if you’ve come across a term for this animal. Alamaca springs to mind, or alpalama. Suggestions please!

Boys in the news!

Our boys have been mentioned in Creuse News, the excellent monthly newsletter produced by Julia Dunbar and her team. Follow this link http://www.creuse-news.com/images/printed-issues/15_creuse_news_jan09.pdf. The boys are on page 6.

I'm eagerly awaiting the arrival of the boys' halters so we can start walking them properly. They're on their way from Rocky Mountain Llamas in Colorado. I've bought all my halters from there as I find them excellent - good quality items, well priced and prompt delivery.
There's not much we can do at the moment apart from keep feeding the boys hay and topping up their water bucket from the kettle to keep it liquid. It's extremely cold, around minus 5 or so. We're all happy to stay indoors! However, I'm about to start an organised brushing campaign to get Seamus and Brendan looking good and to keep their wool in spinnable condition.

Alpacadom arrives

Alpacadom will be the record of our adventures with alpacas. We've had llamas for a couple of years now and decided to branch out into alpacas as well. So on 6 December 2008 Brendan and Seamus arrived at Les Fragnes. They'd journeyed from Basse Normandie, 400 km or so away, in the back of the Renault Scenic and were the calmest, politest passengers we've ever had! From being quite nervous they are now well used to us and always come over to say 'hi' whenever we go into their stable. I'm waiting for their halters to arrive and then we can start training them for trekking.
Brendan is a deep choclate brown, and Seamus is a rich caramel-beige colour. They are both beautiful and their wool is so amazingly soft. They're both aboutu 6 months old and are great little boys.