Weanerific

Amidst the happy chaos of the extended Lutz family arriving yesterday to spend Christmas with us here on the farm, we also weaned the eldest members of the 2011 birth class, bringing them down to live in the Main Barn for the next 5 months or so.  While psychologically traumatic on the crias themselves in the very short term, their dams are usually by this point more than ready for a little healthy separation even if it’s not immediately obvious to them.

Trust me when I say it was time. The last time we put Stacey’s “little” guy, Agamemnon, on the scale almost a month ago he already weighed 83 lb! While the air will be filled with the young alpaca equivalent of handwringing over the next several days, it is our experience that the drama is fairly short lived. The simple act of removing the six month olds away from where they can communicate with their mothers (who stayed up at the Arena) means that the angst just doesn’t have much of a shelf life. In any case this will be a process that will be ongoing on a monthly basis between now and at least May. By the time the time the next wave of adorable little thumbsuckers comes down from the Arena in mid January these first six will already be developing into confident young juveniles. The cycle of life on the farm marches on…