Blog

It’s been a rough year, but one thing that kept me going was the stream of visitors that wanted to experience the alpacas, getting away from the cities and experience a COVID-19 free nature. We took our precautions as needed and had a lovely time!

It is always so nice to get the alpacas cool for the summer. Shearing was done in May, just in time for the hot weather. Shearing is a busy but fun day and this year we had the help from veterinary students who volunteered for the day.. They were a great help!

Every weekend we have visitors coming to see and enjoy the alpacas. In particular it is so nice to see the young children loving the alpacas and learning about them. There is so much curiosity about alpacas now. 10 years ago very few people knew what an alpaca was, whereas now many visitors have fallen in love with them on-line and now want to experience them for real. Maybe these are our future alpaca owners.

We had another wonderful National Alpaca Farm Day at Sweet Water Alpaca Ranch. Many families and couples visited and everyone from toddlers to seniors were enjoying spending time with the animals. There were many opportunities to take close up photos and pet the alpacas. We had spinning and weaving demonstrations that facinated everyone.

We had a wonderful first day of the farm days at Sweet Water Alpaca Ranch, with lots of people enjoying mingling with the alpacas, taking pictures and experiencing a day at the ranch. There were many families with children who were facinated by the animals and learning and seeing the processing of the fiber. We had spinning and weaving demonstrations as well as a small gift shop with alpaca items for sale.

Sweet Water Alpaca Ranch recently had a photo shoot at the ranch for a new bottled water company, Caliwater. It was a fun day and they got some beautiful pictures with my alpacas.

My maiden female Truffels kept me waiting for almost 12 months before she finally started the birthing process. It was 10 o'clock on a Friday night! Very unusual as crias are usually born in the mornings!

It proved to be a very difficult event as she was not able to deliver on her own. And of course no vet was availabe at that time of night. So I was the only one to help. I finally managed to get the cria on the ground, a beautiful perfect dark brown girl. Mom was very attentive

Early morning yesterday I got up and looked out over the aplaca enclosure and saw a little black cria walking around. I ran out and sure enough there was a little girl already dry and on her legs. She must have been born around 4 or 5 o'clock in the morning. The placenta was already there. Mom was obviously Mariana, a female that is bording here.

I did the normal cria care and gave the cria a boost of bottle milk as I didn't think she had nursed (the maiden mom was not quite sure

We had a very successful show last month in Norco. Over 200 animals competed for the top ribbons. I showed 2 females this year and came in 2nd and 5th. I was proud of my girls.

There was a good number of vendors selling alpaca products, anything from little alpaca toys to beautiful scarves, hats, jackets, sweaters, shawls etc. and alpaca yarn. There was also an alpaca craft competition with people voting for best art/craft work. And it didn't stop there! People could also bid fo

Recently my girl Isabella appeared in the TV show Modern Family. She first went to a trainer for about 10 days with 2 of her friends to learn the ropes of being on a studio set. She was a quick learner and performed beautifully on the set! Everyone fell in love with her.

The first weekend in May all the alpacas were sheared. It had been a hot week the week before and everyone was very happy to get the thick fleece off. It took most of the day to shear the 30 alpacas but with all the volunteers helping with the different chores it all ran very smoothly and we had a lot of fun!

Recently History2 channel featured Sweet Water Alpaca Ranch in the series Stan Lee's Superhumans. Chi Master Kanzawa Sensei from Japan claims to be able to put any animal to sleep using the ancient art of Chi. He also cured one of my females that had come down with a very strange paralysis that morning. He used Chi on her and within 10 minutes she was fully restored and never had any more symptoms of lameness! It was quite extraordinary!

It was a fascinating day and you can watch

We had an incredibly successful National Alpaca Farm Day weekend, Sept. 28-29. Hords of visitors were eager to see the alpacas and buy alpaca products. At an estimate we had at least 300 visitors over the weekend and many photos were taken and the alpacas were enjoying the attention and the carrot treats they were rewarded with.

You are welcome to come and visit the ranch with a private appointment.

Over a year ago the TV series, Stan Lee's Superhumans, filmed a segment at my ranch featuring my alpacas. It is currently being shown on the History2 Channel on Sunday evenings. The episode is called "Beast Masters". My segment features Chi Master Kanzawa Sensei who was flown in from Japan. Mr, Sensei claims he can put any animal into a trance by using mind control.

I will post the link here as soon as History2 has unlocked the video.

What he did after the filming thoug

At the beginning of the year two of my alpacas, SW Amadeus' Mozart and SW Perfect Storm, were booked to take part in a music video. We trailered to the location in the Antelope Valley and spent the day filming. Here is the Youtube K. Rose video, Booji Girl, featuring my two boys. To see it you can copy and paste the link below into your browser window.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LXkXH6DX0-A

Finally we were able to shear the alpacas. Shearing was a little later than previous years, but with the cool spring that we have had it worked out fine. The heat has now set in with a vengence.

The almost dozen helpers enjoyed the busy day on the farm. The animals were calm and co-operative. I am convinced the alpacas who have previously been sheard remember how good it feels to have all of that fleece taken off. Last year my girl Madonna was having a spitting fit, whereas this

This past weekend I took 5 alpacas, 2 of mine and 3 agisters, to the SWRAS alpaca show in Norco, Southern California. It was a wonderful weekend with over 300 entries. My lovely girl SW Lexie took 1st price in her class. I also received ribbons in the very competitive classes, Get of Sire (SW Inca Bronze) and Produce of Dam (Tsunami's Valentina).

This week two of my alpacas went on location in the Mojave Desert. Both Perfect Storm and Amadeus' Mozat did an outstanding job and performed like pros despite scary masked men, flowing gowns and spotlights in their faces. The shoot was for a music video with a young singer, K. Rose.

We had a lot of fun, but the boys were happy after a long day's work to be home again with the rest of the herd.

I will post the Ytube link as soon as I get it.

Five weeks ago I was faced with having to bottle feed a young cria. The first week I took her in the house at night and kept her in the bathroom so that she was protected from the cold nights, and I could feed her in comfort. She was fed every 2-3 hours. After a week she stayed out at night and got the last feed late in the evening, then first thing in the morning.

She is doing well and gaining weight very nicely. However, with the holidays coming up I was trying to find a way for