Thursday, February 7, 2008

llamas are so cute

My llamas are trying to unload some feed from the truck this morning. They are such smart animals. Maybe even easier to train than pigs! Pigs are supposedly the smartest animals on earth.

Show a llama something three times and they have it down pat, even bad habits. If you want something that is easy to train get a couple of these really cute animals. They don't particularly want their heads touched, but otherwise, they are so cool to be with.

My brother brought me nine beautiful ladies a couple of years ago. They are all colors of the fiber artist's rainbow. Everything from light tan and white to chocolate and jet black. They do not care to get sheared, but it can be done easily. Just hobble them so they can't rear and stomp you and tie up their heads so they don't spit or bite.

Of course, they don't bite hard as they only have one set of teeth like sheep and goats. Their care is like sheep and goats also. But they are good foragers. They have pruned all my trees perfectly around the bottoms. The problem is they will probably prune my rose bush when it leafs out too.

Their gestation period is almost a whole year. And I can control that fairly well as "Joe Camel" the male my brother got lives at his house seventy miles away. "Joe" will be coming to visit in April. They can withhold giving birth until the weather is right, so we don't have to worry too much about unexpected snow storms freezing the babies. And they only give birth during the daylight hours!! That way this "midwife" doesn't have to be checking them all hours of the dark night!

I am thinking of spinning the wool just as it comes off them without dehairing. I can spin both the warp and weft threads for rugs without dehairing the wool. If I want some for sweaters, I will have to send it off to be processed. I have not decided on that yet.

Listen to the llama song: http://www.albinoblacksheep.com/flash/llama

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