CHEROKEE ALPACAS
of Cornwall

DIARY

OCTOBER

My house sale has fallen through yet again, twice this year.  The bottom of the chain pulled out. Back to plan B, fell more scrub land and grass.  So far cleared about half an acre of blackthorn and bramble. The problem is the burning of the massive bonfires, as everytime we light it, it rains.

My black stud had small lumps on his nose, my vet thought they were warts. But it turns out he had an allergic reaction to midge bites.  I have bought neem oil, fantastic smelly stuff.  But works a treat, all lumps gone and it keeps all biting insects off.

As I was driving up my drive, Mr fox was sat under my apple tree. Now I know who is responsible for nicking of with my silkie bantams.  Why cant he take my noisy cockerel and leave my girls alone. 

SEPT 2008

were do I start,  The rain all summer has been a pain.  I have grass seeded the back of my house, which is vertical. It is growing great with the rain.  My boys are back here again.  I went up to wales and have bought another grey female, suki.  I now have 2 grey females. I had the micron results back on my 4 year old grey female very good at 21 micron.  I went to St mawes to see the tall ships, fantastic day, hot sunny, had a picnic, walked about 5 miles.  The best day in ages.  I went to Llama land on sunday to meet up with our cornwall alpaca group, another lovely day.  Had a viewing todayon my house, on one hand cant wait to sell and move on with my life. On the other hand scared stiff of starting over on my own.  I went to a poultry auction at the wade bridge showground last week.  Bought 8 different coloured silkie bantams.  Very sad day, as in a corner was a lone young male alpaca.  Not the place to sell an alpaca, no paperwork with him, no history.  The lady who bought him, I gave her as much advice as I could and put her in touch with popham alpacas as she lives not far from them.  She has now bought a friend from them to keep the young lad company. 

JULY 2008

I havent written for ages. The alpacas I am keeping have now gone around the corner to Kethua park on livery. My black boy Stormchaser has just started work.  Very funny watching him loose his virginity.  Over excited like a teenager,  frothing at the mouth and making a silly ogle sound. His voice hasnt broken yet bless him.  First maiden went down easy, second one wouldnt go down, he was on tip toes, couldnt manage it.  Brought in an expereinced stud he couldnt get her down either.  The blue tongue vacine has come in, typical it chucking it down so will wait a few days, as we have 22 to do.

errant husband has now left with his girlfriend, so I have decided to do B&B so I can now do spinning weekends. It could be fun seeing the alpacas, chit chat, plenty of tea and bics. 

April 2008

After one of my girls being 8 weeks over due, she at long last had her baby, with help from John Coates from Kerthua park.  Big boy jet black,  As all my boys are named after weather, I have named him chinook.

APRIL 2008

Back trying to work this web page  ,  So much has happened since October.  In the process of moving house again after only being here for a year. This time due to divorce.

Anyway I am having to sell of the herd, which I dont really want to do.  I have 3 girls left, my best ones I was going to keep,  Still hoping to keep my stud.  All depends on finding a house with a bit of land.  I Lost an alpaca in January,  young maiden 14 months old.  All was well in the morning, by 1pm she had to be put down.  On post mortom she died of BVD.  Very odd as there are no cows anywhere nearby, none ever been any on the land.  So All have been blood tested and all came back negative thank god.

October 2007

I haven't written my diary for a while due to computer breaking down. I am now learning to work my own web page which isn't easy for a computer phobic dyslectic.

At long last I have the imports down here transported by Colin my shearer in a small gap between fmd outbreaks.  One of them has bad mite problem, bald ears and eyebrows.  So far tried every thing known to man, eprinex and pig oil, uddermint, tea tree oil.  I have now spoken to crossgates bioenergetics, and am now trying sulphur powder and thallium,  mite spray.

As for the chicken fiasco I have spent a fortune on ebay buying rare breed eggs.  Out of about 60 eggs I have 13 chicks. The two buff orpington female youngsters I bought.  One started crowing yesterday, so I don't think they are girls after all.

Ian is due home from sea, at end of this month after chasing hurricanes in the Caribbean since July.  Plus spending the odd day on exotic islands sunbathing.  He will have a shock with the job list I have for him.

My alpaca workshop is now finished, for hand spinning and weaving my fleece. 

June 2007

At long last the imports arrived up in Lincolnshire 15 adults with 7 cria 5 of which are mine. Drove up there to pick out which we did with ear tag numbers.

I have 3 black girls 1 grey and one white and one black cria. They will have to stay up there for a few weeks for vet checks and re mating.

First thing I did on returning home was check on my chickens, horror, all of them had been killed, couldn’t believe it as it was electric fenced. So I have bought more eggs off EBay and starting again, they are due to hatch at the beginning of July.

Until my land is cleared of bracken and shrub, my alpacas are on rented land belonging to a holiday barn complex. So it was great excitement when the shearer came. There were all these people with their cam corders, thankfully the alpacas behaved themselves, no screaming or spitting.

Since then it has rained none stop, the alpacas are all shivering but wont go into the shelter. I don’t know whether you can put on adult coats on them when it rains so much.

We booked to go to the Peter Gabriel concert at the Eden project, should have been a great day. Sat out on the grass enjoying the sun in June. But it chucked it down, all you could see was umbrellas, instead of shorts we were in waterproofs. But it was still a good night.

I have sold my boys, leaving me with one black boy I am keeping, so he has had to go on holiday to Kethua park. He is only a year old, so they put him in with 2 girls and 2 boys all the same age. Pedro changed personality from shy quite lad to a sex starved monster. He chased around the girls got one down, so they have now been moved. He has settled down with the boys.

My husband Ian has joined his ship out in Barbados, he will be swanning around the Caribbean until October. He is terrified of flying so he flew armed with diazepam and slept the whole flight. He phoned last night to say it was 30°C and sunny.

Hopefully my builder will turn up in the next couple of weeks, to build my workshop. I will then be able to get on with spinning and weaving lessons again, and have somewhere to hold all my wool and alpaca tops for spinning. I can hardly get into the spare bedroom at the moment for wool and stuff.

I went out and bought two buff Orpington chicks, they are very cheeky, I picked one up yesterday to get them used to being handled. The little sod pecked me on the lip and drew blood. I now am sporting a fat lip.

May 2007

After having fantastic weather down here, The heavens opened and we have had rain for days.

I picked the wettest day, last Sunday to move my boys to Polgooth nearer to me. My husband who isn't a natural animal person was dragged out to give me a hand. The boys were down the bottom of a very steep paddock sopping wet. But all went well except we were soaked to the skin.

I was going to take them to the Devon show but not only were they wet through but they had half the hedge and bramble in them, they looked like walking compost heaps.

I bought some more chucks last week, so I thought I would have a go at electric fencing. All done but how do I test it, I asked Ian to put his finger on the wire but he declined, so he asked the dog to put his nose on the wire. I stopped him just in time, but one of the new chucks tried to jump it, and jumped higher than she expected due to a shock, a bit of noise aroused the dog and he touched it, all four legs in the air, then Ian accidentally touched it. So yes it worked.

I am selling my boys which will be sad as they are so cute, all halter trained and love a cuddle.

I have had to rehome one of my Leonbergers (dogs) due to her barking at squirrels all day, driving me mad.

April 2007

We have moved back down to Cornwall at long last. Loaded up the Alpacas into a 40ft wagon no problem they just walked right in.  After a long journey arrived to find the wagon didn’t fit down the lane. No option but to unload up the lane and herd them down to the field, yet again no problem. What well behaved alpacas I have.

I have joined SWAG and missed entering my boys for the Shepton Mallet show, but we went anyway to have a look, what a windy day it was.  This was to be my first go at showing, I will go to the Devon County show in May and have another go.

Just before leaving Lincolnshire my little girl alpaca died, very sad. We had to take her down to Cambridge Vet School in the back of the car.    She wasn’t running about, looked depressed. The vet thought maybe pneumonia, gave antibiotics.  Looked up the field one morning I thought she was dead, all on her own lying down.

The vet at the collage was brilliant - straight away did scans,   x rays, blood tests you name it she had it, but died 3 days later. I couldn’t take the phone call, I had to hand it to Ian as I was too upset.  Found out  after a post mortem that she had abscess’s on her liver, kidney, lungs, plus a ruptured gut. Still no idea what caused all this.

Still don’t know why one of my boys keeps losing his toe nails. I asked the vet at college while I was there, they had never heard of it before. They grow from the nail base but are not attached to the rest of his toe, so they just fall off. This affects all his feet - doesn’t seem to bother him.  Anyone out there have any ideas?

I am still waiting for my imports from Chile to arrive, getting excited now.

February 2007

I spent the New Year battling high winds, and rain. The roof blew straight off the shelter into the next paddock. Ian my husband has spent the last 6 months in the carribean patrolling the islands, he has been there since October, leaving me with all the animals to look after.

Pedro my weanling boy managed to get his head stuck in the stock fencing, thank god for neighbours, as they alerted me. We had to cut him free.