Sorry about the long lag in posting. We have been pretty busy at the farm with different fiber events.  This past weekend though Vlad the Fox Impaler finally lived up to his name.  As Scott was sitting on the couch he saw Vlad perk up from his perch on the mulch pile.  Then he took off running and Scott soon discovered he was chasing a fox across the yard.  Unfortunatley for Vlad he did not catch it because he does run a bit slow, but he sure gave the fox something to remember about coming back to our place.  It only took 2 years but finally Vlad is a full fledged guard dog.

Our fiber has come back from the mill.  It really makes me wish that I had more. Its extremely fine and beautiful roving. Its listed in our Etsy store in very limited quantities. 

We are also working on collecting Vlad's fiber. I have a 15 gallon trash bag so far..Someday I'll de-dog it and possibly spin it up.

I'm headed out to Magical farms again next week to work with Roo on teaching students to dye and card with wonderful alpaca.  It should be tons of fibery fun.

Shearing day started out with rain the night before. We had the boys trapped in their shed because the number one rule in shearing is KEEP THEM DRY! Unfortunately the rain came in sideways so we woke up to moist animals. A fan blowing directly on them helped out some but luckily by noon the sun came out and we were able to turn them out to finish drying. We had lots of wonderful people show up for shearing day to join in the fun of alpacas. We learned that our boys will follow our blue feed scoop anywhere! Poor Mark didn't realize this when he went after the boys with feed.

The kids really enjoyed meeting the boys and giving them tons of treats..I think its pretty obvious that the alpacas like little kids.
When our shearer Kathy from Special K Alpacas came we enlisted the help of several of Scott's co-workers to hold down some feet and stand within spitting distance as we sheared the boys. Thankfully there was no spitting involved, and a big thanks to Mike, Laura and Cindy for helping us out. Kathy did a great job at shearing the boys fast with very minimal second cuts which is important because it means less waste. Lucky for the boys she decided their teeth were ok and there was no dentistry performed. So now we have approximately 6 pounds of good blanket fiber washed up and going out to Spinderlla's mill on Monday to be made into roving.

Our Etsy shop is up and running and I"ll be adding more to it as I get it made up. Keep an eye out for felted alpacas,  and bird nesting materials. Get your birds the finest in nest linings with our suet cages stuffed with alpaca fiber!!

Finally on the Vlad front, I think he is starting to get a clue that he's a guard dog. We caught him watching the chickens instead of chasing them the other day. But the fact that he is licking his lips does make me worry a bit.

Well we kept our "guardian" Vlad contained for 4 days. We thought that a 5' fence, and an underground fence surrounding it would contain our wandering guardian. WE WERE WRONG! At 4am I heard barking, which is normal for a great pyr, but the barking came around behind the house, where it should not have been. So we turned on the porch light and there was Vlad sitting on the porch.

We had introduced him to the alpacas last night and he tried playing with them and just acting downright goofy. From what we could figure out he climbed/dug under his gate to get in with the boys and then went under the main gate. His electric collar should have discouraged him politely first with a beep and then with a bit of a shock. Obviously he decided that the shock was worth it. When we got up for real this morning we shaved his neck to try and make a better contact, figuring he surely wasn't getting shocked and ignoring it. Turns out he was. Scott came home from work to a wet dog under the porch.

So now we are at a loss. We're going to try fencing the gaps a bit better to stop him from going under. Maybe a stronger system or a horse charger with a live wire at the bottom of the fence? You'd think he'd want to stay with his herd to protect them. He must think we need protecting more. Guess we'll just have to keep trying with him. I sure wish his natural instinct would kick in though. It wouldn't be so bad if he stayed around the house or wandered back and forth from the pasture to the house. Anyone have any other good ideas/deterrents, or a good pet psychic to convince him he should stay where he belongs??

On a good note though, we did halter up Trooper yesterday and trimmed his nails. We rewarded him by walking him to a pasture with real grass for a few nibbles. The other 3 were very jealous, so hopefully they remember the reward when we start working with them on lead.

Scott's by himself at the farm this weekend, so hopefully everything goes somewhat peacefully, Vlad escaping isn't a good start though, nor is the heavy rain we are forecasted for.

We will be posting more info about our shearing day (Sunday May 8) next week. We are planning on having a cookout, demos, visiting with Vlad (if he's in the yard where he is supposed to be), alpaca hugging and more. Let us know if you are interested in coming!!

Our alpacas are here!! Big thanks to Amanda & her dad for coming over Monday evening with them to bring us some alpacas, hay & fiber. The boys had a ton of fun eating what little grass we had and figuring out how to step on the scale without spitting.  They promptly managed to eat all the grass in the holding area pasture while Scott and I sipped a nice Muscato d'asti and watched the sun set on our new alpaca adventure.

Unfortunately for the boys they didn't realize they could enter the shed and promptly got soaked that night with a heavy rain fall. Luckily on Wednesday when it rained again, they figured it out. 

Scott went out & promptly collected "magic" beans the day after they arrived and was rewarded with a half a bucket for the plants. So hopefully this trend of him cleaning the pasture continues :). Enjoy the photos of the boys and feel free to stop by and visit them.

I will be getting some fiber up in my Etsy store soon hopefully and have included some photos of my washing and drying station for fleece. I also got some wonderful 30% alpaca, 30% merino, 20% bamboo, and 20% nylon sock yarn in to do some test dying on for my future Superheros vs. Villains sock yarn club. Keep your eyes open for May for a big update in the store.