I’d venture to say that most alpaca breeders don’t shear their crias until the spring following the crias’ births. But those cria fleeces become messy very quickly as their fine, velcro-like tips attract hay and other debris. We’ve learned that we can get much cleaner and more valuable fleeces in the spring if we shear our crias soon after birth. And the bonus is that the crias are more comfortable during the summer.
We sheared our first five 2013 babies on Sunday. It’s very exciting to exam the fleeces up close. We loved what we saw! We have two very nice crias sired by Nibblewise of Elfenwood: a dark brown female and a silver gray male. We have hopes the gray male will be breeding quality. And we have three whites: a female and two males. One of the males is full brother to our champion herdsire, Snowshoe Aristides. The little guy (who still doesn’t have a name!) is looking fantastic!
Here are before and after pics of the gray male, Snowshoe Rainmaker.
