Sunday, March 25, 2007

New alpaca arrive at Furbelow Farms, Logan And Misha

Today at about 1 P.M. Logan arrived at Furbelow Farms in an unusual Alpaca trailer.
Within 10 minutes Misha arrived in the back of a minivan.

The idea here was to bring the 2 new boys to the farm at the same time. Each new male alapca
came from a different farm. The purpose of arranging for both new alpacas to arrive at the same time is so that neither one of them will be the new boy.

We now have 7 male alpacas. Clearly Logan is the new herdsire. There wasn't much of a challenge of his kingship from the 2 other boys. And Logan knows Misha from previous alpaca shows.

So now we have 4 adult or almost adult male alpaca in one pen reanging from about age 1 year to Logan who is almost 3 years at this point.

In the other pen there is Pearl who is due in the early part of June and the 2 youngest male alpaca, Vic and Stormy. Pearl is bred to Shazam. He is a beauty! here is link to check him out:
http://alpacanation.com/herdsires/03_viewherdsire.asp?name=18309
I think he is even for sale! At one point I think they were trying to get $75K for him but the price is probably down to closer to 60K now. It will be interesting to see what kind of Cria pearl puts out, we are hoping for a girl! To check out pearl here is the link, but no picture is there:
http://alpacanation.com/alpacasforsale/03_viewalpaca.asp?name=58532

I will be adding photos of all of them on the Furbelow Farms website soon @ www.furbelowfarms.com, right now the only picture I have is of Logans head.
Wow Logan is a beauty! Logan is a 3 time blue ribbon winner and his cria are sure to be nothing short of amazing.

The grass is growing like mad on the farm and the alpacas are eating it down as fast as it grows.

Today I cleaned up the usual poop. The boys are so neat! they only ever have used ONE pile!
I hope the new boys can agree on the pile placement. It is so easy to clean up after these boys.
I installed some new feed bowls for the new alpacas and cleaned out thier hay bin, which I made out of mostly plywood.

Today I got some plans for a chute, which I will need to build soon. The shearing is coming quickly on April 18th. I gave the last $1200 cash today for Misha and paid in full for him.
Misha will be the first alpac we have paid off and will soon send in the ARI certificate to update it with the new onwers name. We applied to ARI yesterday to get our farm/owner ID.

So far we only belong to the VAOBA, I don't know if and when we will be joining AOBA.

We really need to determine the place for the new steel barn and level it and get the foundation
in. Finances are getting tighter and there is still so much more to do.
We have a heaping pile of brush and dead trees from the clearing that there was no way I was going to pay 5,000 USD to make disappear (by backhoes digging a big hole and putting trees in and burning).

Life goes on, there wasn't any Alpaca spitting matches going on between the new alpacas.
And when feeding time came as usual Regiie thought the first bowl was his. LOgan ran over quickly and reminded him who the new king was and that Reggie no longer owned the first food bowl.

Logan is such a sweety. He is the only male alpacas I have that will eat carrots out of my hand.
And logan is not afraid of people. He is so big and powerful.
It was funny that when the wind blew and he heard the tarp snap in the wind for the first time he jumped in fear not knowing what it was. Certainly he will get used to it.

Alpaca count up to 10. 7 male alpacas and 3 pregnant female alpaca. We are of course hoping for 3 new girls when all the pregnant alpaca deliver thier cria. It is not likely that we will be selling any of the new cria which are due this year. Pearl will be the first to deliver, sometime in the beggining of June, we cannot hardly wait!

Friday, March 23, 2007

Ron Paul Accepts Debate Invitation From Nancy Reagan

Congressman Ron Paul has accepted Nancy Reagan's invitation to participate in a presidential debate to be held at the Reagan Presidential Library on May 3, 2007. MSNBC will moderate and televise the 90-minute debate starting at 5:00 p.m. ET.



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Thursday, March 22, 2007

New Alpacas coming to Furbelow Farms

Before the end of the month we should have on site the first 2 alpacas we purchased, Logan and Misha. This way all Alpacas will get sheared on April 14th, it was previously scheduled for the 13th.

It has been a while since I posted. Not much has changed in regards to the Alpacas. Pearl, Bliss and Tipper are getting bigger as thier pregnancy progresses. They are such curious animals.
They always want to see what I am doing, even after they determine that I don't have any "new" food for them. Stormy is turning out to be a real sweety, he is starting to look like his brother Reggie and thier dad Beau. They eat grain 2 times a day. The grass is busting loose all over the farm. We must have planted 1000 lbs in the last 6 months.

Furbelow farms started as 25 acres of bascially forest. Much has been happening on the farm.
we have about 5 acres clear now and grass is growing all over the place. It is so exciting to see the grass as this can only decrese the amount of hay I have to buy.

The young Alpacas got the rest of thier shots and they all got deworming shots to prevent the menegial worm which comes from the white tail deer, which seems to be in adundance in our area. The anatolian sheppards puppies should scare off the deer at only 7 months old they are already a force to be reconed with. If they jump on you, it is all you can do to stay standing.

The farm is so beautiful when the sun is shinning and the alpacas are rolling in the red goochland clay. Pearl suddenly isn't so white anymore.

One of these days I am going to catch whichever alpaca is washing thier feet in the water bowls.

The next great challenge is paying for and erecting the new steel barn we ordered. We patiently await the shearing and still wonder what the best course of action to take with the raw fiber will be. Stormy, the only Alpaca who real doesn't mind being petted has fur that is softer than silk.

Goochland tripled the Real estate assesment and we filed for land use. After all it is a farm that is zoned agricultural and what is not used for farming is still a dense forest. We have many piles of oak trunks laying around from the clearing and the brush pile is settling down.

So far no regrets! We love Alpacas and Alpaca breeding and farming. Cleaning up the poop is so cool. Really, I am amazed at how they all get together and agree on pooping in one pile!
If you don't clean it up immediately it starts to look like an ant hill! And what great fertilizer it makes! Since Alpacas only eat grain, grass, and a small amount of vegatables and have 3 stomaches thier poop is as good as anything for fertilizing. I hope someday to have some extra to share with others or sell like someone I saw selling it for $8.50 a bag!

In the mean time we will keep feeding them, loving them, and collecting fertilizer waiting for the new babies!

We, Elijah and Ginger had a new baby boy (Joseph Daniel Marks) on Valentines day so we have been busy at home so perhaps that has cut down on my postings. He was 10lbs 11 ounces!
WOW! ANOTHER FARM WORKER YEAH!