Welcome to the world CCNF Exuberant Frost Blossom-ET, we’ve been waiting to meet you…

Though the first and last names bestowed upon the baby girl that was born here 2 days ago honor both her birth mother (CCNF Exuberance) and biological mother (CCNF Orange Blossom Special) respectively, it is in point of fact her middle name that defines what is most unique about this little one. Though my better half was trained in alpaca embryo transfer work over 10 years ago now, that was really just a beginning. For the better part of two years now, Jennifer has been working on a project with potentially far greater implications for the global alpaca community. In concert with Dr. Curt Youngs, an embryologist at Iowa State University, as well as with her original ET mentors, Paul and Sally Taylor, they had been trying to produce a pregnancy and subsequent live birth from an alpaca embryo that was previously vitrified in liquid nitrogen: Exuberant Frost Blossom is that cria! So far as we know, Frost Blossom is the first alpaca cria ever born — worldwide — from a previously frozen embryo. Though the techniques and protocols for freezing and later thawing embryos in other livestock species have been well established, the unique properties of camelid embryos mean that this has really been uncharted territory. It is a significant enough event in fact, that Jen and Dr. Youngs have been invited to make an oral presentation this coming January at the 46th Annual Conference of the International Embryo Technology Society in New York City.

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