Friday, April 29, 2011

Where has the time gone?

My how time flies! I've been a little lax about keeping up with the blog, sorry. The folks have come and gone for their winter visit. They stayed long enough to warm up before heading back east to the cold and wet. The Southwest Regional Alpaca Show is a memory. We didn't show any alpacas this year, but I worked harder than ever! Next time I'll know better and bring some animals with me so I can rest a little.

Brian finally got our vegetable garden in. It got off to a shaky start. I think I had a nitrogen deficiency in the soil. Everything started greening up nicely once I started adding some paca-poo tea to my watering regime. I made a map of what was planted where so I could keep it all straight as the garden grew. Should have worked. Didn't I show cantaloupe melons on my map, unfortunately the seeds are labeled honey dew, and quite frankly, now that we're seeing fruit, they sure as heck look like summer squash.

Fortunately we like all three of those, so whatever we actually get will be eaten.
The babies are growing well. Belle is turning out to be quite the character. She will follow me around the pen, telling me stories while I feed and pick up. She loves to have her back and neck scratched. You can almost hear her purring like a cat. I've never had an alpaca behave like this before.

Flynn is also quite friendly. He knows what the pellet bucket looks like and will come running if he thinks there is the slightest chance for treats.

Poor Jack had another bout of fever last month. We got him stated on penicillin, which acts fast and knocks the fever down within a day or two. We also got him back in Draxxin, which as a slower acting drug, but far less painful for him to get. We'll keep him on this for a minimum of ten weeks and see if that will finally get to the source of the infection.

We've been shearing in this area for the last couple of weeks. Just about everyone is done. Now we start over with skirting, tumbling and washing fleeces. I see lots of lovely yarns in our near future.

As for the fleece we sent off, I'm expecting yarn to start coming back pretty soon. I finally let my curiosity get the best of me and called yesterday for an eta. Bummer that the only person that knew the answer had already left for the day. Oh well, I guess I'll just have to wait a little longer.

That's it for now.