Big Rock Alpaca Farm

Right on the tail of PAOBA Breeder’s Showcase 2010 we had shearing day.  We again went to Paso Ligero for shearing.  Kim from Paso Ligero is wonderful.  Since we don’t have a trailer she again this year came and got all of our animals and transported them to her place for shearing.  We couldn’t ask for a better neighbor.

It was a long day.  We started shortly after 7:00 AM since we had almost 50 alpacas to shear and the guys doing the shearing were going to another neighboring farm to shear after we were done.  Ian from Big Mount Alpacas had enough animals at his farm this year to have them coming there, instead of him bringing all his alpacas to Kim’s place.

We got lots of great fiber off some wonderful animals.  The shearers did a good job again this year.  I don’t think I’ve seen him yet knick an animal.  I can’t say that for myself, I hit some blood on a couple toenails, but not many.

We now have 12 more blankets and 12 more seconds bags of wonderful alpaca fiber here to work with.  If you are interested we could still use some more hand spinners for spinning the fiber.

All of our short cuts, leg fiber and other waste is being sent to help clean up the oil spill in the Gulf.  Isn’t alpaca fiber wonderful!

Alpaca shearing

Tags: Events, Hand Spinning by Allen
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Well PAOBA Breeder’s Showcase 2010 is over.  It was a great weekend.  We got to meet lots of people at our farm stall.  If you stopped by, it was great talking to you.

We had ‘The Sock Lady’ from from Appalachian Sock Company there demonstrating her antique sock knitting machine.  Many people were very fascinated by it (including me).  She cranked out some wristies and a cowl with some of our 100% suri yarn.  She did knit in some nylon for the wristies to give them some more stretch.

Kelly did some spinning of alpaca fiber when she wasn’t running around trying to make sure I had the animals where I was supposed to.  The results weren’t as good as we had hoped for, but when are they ever.  It was a new experience showing in some of the production classes, Best Bred and Owned Yearly Male and Produce of Dam.  the product of dam class was especially neat because Josh handled Gaston for the judges examination.

Snowfox produce of dam

Tags: Shows by Allen
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