Then there was this guy!

We were very excited when our lone high-end grey production girl, Maid Marian, gave birth to a grey Ring of Fire son last summer! Whether I had Gandalf on the mind or just a little word play going on, I think he was named Smoke Ring not long after he was dry. I remember going up to the Arena after getting one of those calls from my better half as in “Uh, I think you might want to come and take a look at this one…” Fourteen years into this little gig of ours, Jennifer is not easily impressed anymore where newborn crias are concerned so her tone got my attention in a hurry. The rest as they say is history and today Smoke Ring has grown into a striking young Herdsire in the making.

We have quite honestly hemmed and hawed about what we would do with this young guy. Regardless of how we have defined ourselves over the years though, “Cas-Cad-Nac, breeders of grey alpacas” has never really rolled off the tongue unless it was also accompanied by a smart-ass smirk of one variety or another. With a only a couple of exceptions, most often the grey alpacas we have produced are what we would frankly consider to have been fawns that didn’t quite take, if you know what I mean (CCNF Marguerite being the most egregious example)? The fact that Smoke Ring actually came out the way we had hoped for does nothing to alter the simple truth that he is severely outnumbered here at CCNF, where probably 80% of the herd is fawn or lighter. To put it in further perspective he is one of only 5 grey alpacas in a herd of 230 right now. Of the others, 2 are his direct relatives (dam and sister) and the other is a 14 year old male. There’s not apt to be a whole lot of action for Smoke Ring if he sticks around! His vital stats and official write-up can be found on our web site here.