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We've added a new member to the JADE family. I think instead of calling the business JADE Alpacas we should have named it JADE Fuzz - so that we could expand a bit...because our newest member is a beautiful angora bunny. His name is Mostyn and he's about 6 months old. He was purchased from Willowcot Stud in Hereford and is a beautiful show quality white angora - perfect for shearing and mixing with our alpaca wool. In fact, he arrived already sheared so we've got the first bag of fleece all ready! He's a bit shy now as he's settling into his rabbit mansion! I'm hoping he will come out and play with me soon!
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We were very excited to take part in our first show - the Heart of England Spring Alpaca Fiesta 2017. After feedback from Shirley and Rob at Toft Alpacas (http://www.toft-alpacas.co.uk/), our 9 month old baby boy Quartz was considered good enough to have a shot at the show! Rob and Shirley very kindly helped us with all of the logistics, including getting booked on and also transporting Quartz to the show along with their own animals they were entering. They have been extremely supportive and generous throughout our alpaca journey!!!! The show is split into different classes, based on the breed, sex, colour and age of alpaca. Quartz was entered into the Junior White Male Category. As there were oven 12 entries, the round was split into 2. Having spent what felt like an hour picking all of the bits of the cardboard flooring out of his fleece ready for the show he was good to go. We were in the second round and Jacquie volunteered to walk him into the ring. Shortly after entering she was asked by the judge to leave the ring!! We thought we had done something wrong as no one else had to leave, but it was just because he wanted to see Quartz walk a little further. Turns out we need to learn a little more about how to show the Alpacas and present them in a show! Quartz did well earning a 6th place!! The judge commented that he would have received 4th place if he had walked a little better, something to work on for next time and a good result for our first show!!    So after the sad news that Anduril passed away in January, we are down to 1 female (Marie) and 2 lovely baby boys. This has really put a dink into our herd growth plans, so we decided following the Heart of England Fiesta to visit some of the highest quality breeders and invest in 2-3 more pregnant females for breeding. Over the Easter weekend we were lucky enough to visit 3 farms run by some of the best Alpaca breeders in the UK, who specialised in top quality white Alpacas. We were kindly hosted by Mary-Jo from Bozedown Alpacas, Mick and Liz George from Houghton Hall Alpacas and Bob Hyde of Furze park Alpacas. All of them breed top quality Alpacas and were all extremely generous with their time, knowledge and enthusiasm. We have loads of information to review before making some decisions soon! A massive thanks to all of them, we have a fantastic weekend and if you are interested in some premium quality Alpacas then please visit them: |
Jacquie
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