Home | Member Login | About AN | Join AlpacaNation
llamas for sale
  ALPACAS FOR SALE   |   HERDSIRES   |   ALPACA FARMS   |   FIBER MARKET   |   SERVICES   |   PRODUCTS   |   AN COMMUNITY
Alpaca Forum at AlpacaNation
Main Menu | Profile | Register | Active Topics | Members | Search | FAQ | Forum Rules NEW! | Active Polls NEW!
 All Forums
 Alpaca Discussion Forums
 4. Breeding and Genetics
 Poorly expressed gray (again)

Note: You must be registered in order to post a reply.
To register, click here. Registration is FREE!

Screensize:
UserName:
Password:
Format Mode:
Format: BoldItalicizedUnderlineStrikethrough Align LeftCenteredAlign Right Horizontal Rule Insert HyperlinkInsert Email Insert CodeInsert QuoteInsert List
   
Message:

* HTML is OFF
* Forum Code is ON
Smilies
Smile [:)] Big Smile [:D] Cool [8D] Blush [:I]
Tongue [:P] Evil [):] Wink [;)] Clown [:o)]
Black Eye [B)] Eight Ball [8] Frown [:(] Shy [8)]
Shocked [:0] Angry [:(!] Dead [xx(] Sleepy [|)]
Kisses [:X] Approve [^] Disapprove [V] Question [?]

 
Check here to subscribe to this topic.
   

T O P I C    R E V I E W
jillmcm Posted - 07/22/2011 : 7:02:53 PM
So, a year or so ago I posted about a male I was selling because I thought he might be a poorly expressed silver gray (and we don't breed for gray). We bred him to one female before he left, and that cria is on the ground now - with rose gray ears and lower legs, medium brown blanket and a white triangle under his tail! Seems to me that where I would expect a tuxedo to be white on a classic gray, there's enough white fiber to classify as rose gray (pretty sure - the white fibers are clearly visible and make up 1/3? of the fibers in these areas) - but the blanket has almost no white hairs (hard to tell because the little bugger is hyperactive). So this guy has more white than his dad - but could anyone reasonably expect to ever get a full blown classic gray out one of these poorly expressed guys?

Jill McElderry-Maxwell
Bag End Suri Alpacas of Maine - ¡BESAME!
Benton, ME
(207) 453-0109
bagendsuris@roadrunner.com
http://www.bagendsuris.com
20   L A T E S T    R E P L I E S    (Newest First)
APacaFunFarm Posted - 11/28/2011 : 07:21:32 AM
quote:
Originally posted by bobvicki

I have read this thread again and have some questions.

I have a really nice soft fleece juvenile suri male that is about 5 months old.
His dam is My female Deseret, a Bay black who's own dam is a TB import and her sire is the TB Diablo. The young males sire is my own Perchebo Smoke, who was born looking TB but in his only shows color checked at DSG. He is out of my own TB Bonanza in Black and DF Hallelula Hummer who is out of 2 TB's. Bonanza is out of TB Fruzane Noir and a MB import.

This cria was born with a light fawn coloring, kind of gray nose and almost gray toes. He looks light fawn almost with a light golden color or tint. I haven't really been paying a lot of attention to this boy until the other day when putting out fresh hay, he was standing next to me and as I looked down at him his top line looked very gray, almost an inch on both side of the part. I caught him up and looked all over his fleece, parting it on the sides, hip, legs and chest and under all that light golden fawn is a clearly medium silver solid color. I told my daughter about it at supper and had to take her out to the pasture to catch the little guy because she wouldn't believe me other wise. I am sure if I sheared him to 1/2 inch all over his body and legs he would be medium silver gray. This is not just a topline color changing, the gray is everywhere!

Has anyone else had this happen to them? How does fawn turn to gray?
With all the TB in his ancestry is this just a fluke since both his parents are so much darker than him? Would you repeat this breeding?

Bob




Bob,

I think you are describing a phenomenon that I have seen only twice in our herd, both animals in the same linage, descended from a TB female. The cria in question were both out of gray sires or dams (F1 and F2 out of the original TB dam). Describing their fleece color change could sound like the cria tip color change Ken has mentioned, but in reality is something else.

Here's what we've seen. The cria were born looking brown. At about 6 weeks of age (about the time they started eating grain) the fleeces turned black. This was an abrupt, almost shocking, very sudden color change over the entire animal. It was not an "amniotic fluid" type of color change as the crias had been growing brown fleece for 6 weeks.

If your male continues to act like my cria you might see yet another color change, with color reverting back to almost the same color you started with.With our latest cria this gives us (from tip to base) a MB..TB/BB..DB tricolor fleece, making this female unshowable as a juvenile, but with a really cool "cottage industry" fleece that will make a nifty heathered yarn.

I don't know what's going on here, but suspect it is a combination of genetic and epigenetic color controls triggered by change in diet (milk, then milk/grass/grain, then grass/grain). In your case you might have a boy that would have grayed out eventually but got a sudden push towards color change by change in diet. Given the rarity of this color change in my herd, along with the presence of the trait in one pedigree I suspect this might be a Mendelian recessive with a relatively low gene frequency.

Please let us know if his color fades back towards fawn in the coming months.

Best regards,

Neil

Neil Padgett
A Paca Fun Farm
Dickerson,MD
mpcpneilp@gmail.com
www.apacafunfarm.com
Ian Watt Posted - 11/26/2011 : 11:09:22 PM
Neil is absolutely spot-on with his comments about dying in batches.

Some years ago I spoke with a couple of commercial wool dyers in England and they explained the logic behind lot numbering in wool and they believed that in alpaca it would be even more important because of the lack of closeness between primary and secondary hair micron and medullation. Put simply, medullated fibers and highly differentiated micron counts take up dye differently than solid fibers and this is complicated a little more by the high numbers of partially medullated fibers in the stronger micron ranges.

For alpaca yarn purchasers buying dyed yarns, the lot numbering will be the ONLY way they can get any sort of predictability in the evenness of color in their product range - even more so, according to these men, if it is a colored fiber being overdyed because of color contamination in the yarn.

So if we have 200 fleeces of one solid color that are washed and mixed thoroughly, we should have a significant number of cones, skeins, whatever of the same color that is consistent between skein or cone. Another 200 fleeces treated in exactly the same way may not produce exactly the same hue or depth of color no matter how good the classing or color identification..

What is the killer is the errant odd color fiber/s in the finished yarn - I was told one fiber in 100 yards rendered the WHOLE BATCH/RUN unsaleable as is and having to be overdyed to make it saleable at a profit. In grey this is not a problem but in white, cream and black it most certainly is!

As processors determine price, it is incumbent on us growers to ensure that what we send for sale is absolutely true to description - if we do not, then we are doomed as a quality supplier of fiber, it is really that simple once we get past a saturated cottage industry.

It is this thinking that led to solid colors being identified on the Australian pedigree from year one and the judging criteria that placed a preference on solid colors - but be sure that this was not an indicator of genetic expression as breeders were very well aware that what you see is not always what is underneath!

I suspect that as alpacas age, they, like humans, tend to grey as well as bald a little which we don't see very much in wool sheep as they are often slaughtered by six years of age whereas we keep alpacas for much longer than that as fiber producers, perhaps to our long-term disadvantage I think.

There are a couple of things we should all consider:

bay black is not the same as true black and should never be mixed with true black if the end product is to be labelled black

beige is light fawn and not white (personally I would love to see it done away with as a color, but that is just me!)

fading tip black should be lotted as a single line and never mixed with anything else

fawn in rose grey is no different than brown - when batched for processing there is simply no difference in the end product so why do we have the difference in the show ring?

Just another two cents worth!!

Cheers to all.

Ian Watt
Alpaca Consulting USA
www.alpacaconsultingUSA.com
jillmcm Posted - 11/26/2011 : 11:11:36 AM
Bob, I got a charcoal gray girl from a TB to TB breeding this year - she looks reddish on the top because of tipping, but underneath, she's a solid dark gray, not a mix of fibers. Neil P. suggested she may be a dilute black that did not dilute to brown. Yours sounds even funkier!

Jill McElderry-Maxwell
Bag End Suri Alpacas of Maine - ¡BESAME!
Benton, ME
(207) 453-0109
bagendsuris@roadrunner.com
http://www.bagendsuris.com
bobvicki Posted - 11/26/2011 : 10:40:47 AM
Hi Ken,

I understand the rose gray mix, but this fiber is not a mixture of colors it is silver gray, like a gray crayon. You can actually see the fibers line where the color changes on individual strands. It is like the TB's with reddish tips that are bleached by the amniotic
fluid and after their 1st shearing stay true black without tipping.

Bob

Bob & Vicki Blodgett
Suri Land Alpaca Ranch
10371 N 2210 Road
Clinton, Oklahoma 73601
641-831-3576
alpaca@htswireless.com
www.alpacanation.com/suriland.asp
julieandken Posted - 11/26/2011 : 07:08:48 AM
Hi Bob,

It sounds like your youngster has his fiber tips bleached by amniotic fluid. Now that it is growing out and especially since his secondaries are now growing in he's greying out. It's my understanding that secondaries continue to emerge until 4 months of age.
His primary fibers are likely larger darker and his secondaries are carrying more white to make the greying more apparent as he's maturing.
As I'm sure you know rose grey is a blend of white and phaemelanin controled "red" i.e. fawn through brown fibers.
I've got at least a half dozen alpacas in my herd like that...ergo my earlier post on this thread (page 2) and the blog on our website.
For some reason, I couldn't convince the AOBA rules committee that there is a continuum between fawn and brown, both manifestations of the amount of phaemelamin pigment, along the grey spectrum.
It defies all logic.
Welcome to the world of fawn rose grey.

Regards,
Ken

quote:
Originally posted by bobvicki

I have read this thread again and have some questions.

I have a really nice soft fleece juvenile suri male that is about 5 months old.
His dam is My female Deseret, a Bay black who's own dam is a TB import and her sire is the TB Diablo. The young males sire is my own Perchebo Smoke, who was born looking TB but in his only shows color checked at DSG. He is out of my own TB Bonanza in Black and DF Hallelula Hummer who is out of 2 TB's. Bonanza is out of TB Fruzane Noir and a MB import.

This cria was born with a light fawn coloring, kind of gray nose and almost gray toes. He looks light fawn almost with a light golden color or tint. I haven't really been paying a lot of attention to this boy until the other day when putting out fresh hay, he was standing next to me and as I looked down at him his top line looked very gray, almost an inch on both side of the part. I caught him up and looked all over his fleece, parting it on the sides, hip, legs and chest and under all that light golden fawn is a clearly medium silver solid color. I told my daughter about it at supper and had to take her out to the pasture to catch the little guy because she wouldn't believe me other wise. I am sure if I sheared him to 1/2 inch all over his body and legs he would be medium silver gray. This is not just a topline color changing, the gray is everywhere!

Has anyone else had this happen to them? How does fawn turn to gray?
With all the TB in his ancestry is this just a fluke since both his parents are so much darker than him? Would you repeat this breeding?

Bob

Bob & Vicki Blodgett
Suri Land Alpaca Ranch
10371 N 2210 Road
Clinton, Oklahoma 73601
641-831-3576
alpaca@htswireless.com
www.alpacanation.com/suriland.asp



Julie and Ken Rosenfeld, MD
Renaissance Ridge Alpacas
Mount Aukum, CA
www.renaissanceridgealpacas.com
530-620-7934
http://www.alpacanation.com/farmsandbreeders/03_viewfarm.asp?name=12721
Kathystumpf Posted - 11/25/2011 : 3:06:48 PM
Hi Bob,
I have no problem believing that your alpaca is turning gray!

Several years ago, I bred our true black sire(with white on head - a Fruzane Noir grandson)to a white female that had a small fawn spot on her shoulder. We were hoping for a colored or patterned cria and were surprised and disappointed when a VERY white female popped out. After about a month or so, we noticed the same thing you have seen - along the top line there was about a half inch of light silver gray. It took several months for her to complete her transformation to all silver gray and now at 5 years old, she would be considered a medium rose gray on her neck, medium silver gray on her blanket and dark silver gray (more black than white fiber) on her legs! Just looking at her from the outside - she looks like a dirty white, as her fiber tips out white as it grows. The only time she looks gray is right after shearing.

So far she has only had one cria for us as we have limited breedings last few years. We bred her to a white herdsire, hoping to bump up her cria's density and fineness. The cria she had was a white and medium fawn appaloosa - very flashy

She is currently bred to a true black, so we are looking forward to seeing what that pairing produces. I don't breed for gray so I don't follow all the gray genetic possiblities, but I suspect that she is not genetically gray and would not consistantly produce gray even if bred to gray.

Kathy
Kathy Stumpf
Prairie Lake Alpacas
kathy@prairielakealpacas.com
www.prairielakealpacas.com
Smithsburg, Maryland
301-416-0833


quote:
Originally posted by bobvicki

I have read this thread again and have some questions.

I have a really nice soft fleece juvenile suri male that is about 5 months old.
His dam is My female Deseret, a Bay black who's own dam is a TB import and her sire is the TB Diablo. The young males sire is my own Perchebo Smoke, who was born looking TB but in his only shows color checked at DSG. He is out of my own TB Bonanza in Black and DF Hallelula Hummer who is out of 2 TB's. Bonanza is out of TB Fruzane Noir and a MB import.

This cria was born with a light fawn coloring, kind of gray nose and almost gray toes. He looks light fawn almost with a light golden color or tint. I haven't really been paying a lot of attention to this boy until the other day when putting out fresh hay, he was standing next to me and as I looked down at him his top line looked very gray, almost an inch on both side of the part. I caught him up and looked all over his fleece, parting it on the sides, hip, legs and chest and under all that light golden fawn is a clearly medium silver solid color. I told my daughter about it at supper and had to take her out to the pasture to catch the little guy because she wouldn't believe me other wise. I am sure if I sheared him to 1/2 inch all over his body and legs he would be medium silver gray. This is not just a topline color changing, the gray is everywhere!

Has anyone else had this happen to them? How does fawn turn to gray?
With all the TB in his ancestry is this just a fluke since both his parents are so much darker than him? Would you repeat this breeding?

Bob

Bob & Vicki Blodgett
Suri Land Alpaca Ranch
10371 N 2210 Road
Clinton, Oklahoma 73601
641-831-3576
alpaca@htswireless.com
www.alpacanation.com/suriland.asp

bobvicki Posted - 11/25/2011 : 12:39:26 AM
I have read this thread again and have some questions.

I have a really nice soft fleece juvenile suri male that is about 5 months old.
His dam is My female Deseret, a Bay black who's own dam is a TB import and her sire is the TB Diablo. The young males sire is my own Perchebo Smoke, who was born looking TB but in his only shows color checked at DSG. He is out of my own TB Bonanza in Black and DF Hallelula Hummer who is out of 2 TB's. Bonanza is out of TB Fruzane Noir and a MB import.

This cria was born with a light fawn coloring, kind of gray nose and almost gray toes. He looks light fawn almost with a light golden color or tint. I haven't really been paying a lot of attention to this boy until the other day when putting out fresh hay, he was standing next to me and as I looked down at him his top line looked very gray, almost an inch on both side of the part. I caught him up and looked all over his fleece, parting it on the sides, hip, legs and chest and under all that light golden fawn is a clearly medium silver solid color. I told my daughter about it at supper and had to take her out to the pasture to catch the little guy because she wouldn't believe me other wise. I am sure if I sheared him to 1/2 inch all over his body and legs he would be medium silver gray. This is not just a topline color changing, the gray is everywhere!

Has anyone else had this happen to them? How does fawn turn to gray?
With all the TB in his ancestry is this just a fluke since both his parents are so much darker than him? Would you repeat this breeding?

Bob

Bob & Vicki Blodgett
Suri Land Alpaca Ranch
10371 N 2210 Road
Clinton, Oklahoma 73601
641-831-3576
alpaca@htswireless.com
www.alpacanation.com/suriland.asp
JimR Posted - 08/07/2011 : 11:43:35 AM
Speaking of changing color..I have a pure white girl, she was so white and pink she almost looked albino when she was born, and after too, until recently, when I notice she is getting brown (small) areas in her top knot. These two areas are very small, but is that possible or is it from the sun or something?
There is nothing here that could have dyed it light brown that I can see.
Is that possible? She was out of a beige with black highlights(eyeliner, toes etc) and a white dam. She will be 2 in Sept.

Susan Rempe
Four Corners Alpacas
Bloomfield NM
River11524@msn.com
www.AlpacaNation.com/fourcorners.asp
danimac Posted - 08/07/2011 : 03:07:34 AM
Heidi -- not trying to put words into Neil's mouth, , but I suspect he's just frustrated by folks believing that greys are somehow different than all other colors.

What is true is that in a lot of greys (and maybe this is what you were feeling when handling the greys at that farm) the "white" and "black" fibers are different micron counts -- with typically white being finer. So you were feeling fleeces that had a very mixed handle.

So, like Neil mentioned, the commercial mills will tumble 600-1000 lbs of fiber to create a 'dye lot'. I remember John Merrill discussing a couple of years ago the recipe for creating various 'grey' yarn (it's wasn't a 50/50 split of white to black -- I suspect a search of the archives will turn up his post).

But, just like with dyed fiber (even acrylic), you can't make a 100% color match across lots. So whether it's buying paint, yarn, or wallpaper, it's recommended to get all of the same lot at the same time if you want a consistently colored end product.

quote:
if there are spots there is bound to be "contamination" throughout the blanket. In reality (in my herd at least) spots are not at all correlated with color contamination. When we process our fleeces, we just pluck the spots out.


Neil -- I suspect color contamination is a separate gene(s) than spots, though in some herds it seems that they run together. In a couple of my blacks -- they were *pure* black a year or two years ago, but started showing white contamination once they hit ~4 years of age (in fact, one recent purchase has started developing grey just under her chin, which wasn't there when she showed up here in June. So depending on how this age related gene expresses -- you could having anything from mild contamination to those late blooming greys one hears about.

Cheers,
Dani

Dani McKenzie
Longbottom Meadows
Roy, WA
360-400-0348
http://www.longbottommeadows.com
Heidi Christensen Posted - 08/05/2011 : 9:54:31 PM
Damn Neil, folks are just trying to learn.

NO - I had no idea gray is no different than fawn or brown. No one has ever said fawn and brown are "cottage industry only" like they do with grays? What does that tell me - they are not commerically viable. Forgive the heck out of me for being wrong.

Heidi Christensen
WingNut Farm
Graham, Wa
(253) 846-2168
http://alpacanation.com/wingnutfarm.asp
http://wingnut-alpacas.com
APacaFunFarm Posted - 08/05/2011 : 12:14:45 AM
quote:
Originally posted by JimR

So than Neil, is it just for the shows that they give a higher mark to solid blankets,(I was told if everything else is equal in choosing between 2 gray alpacas, the one without spots will win in the ring) and really has no higher value or is more in demand by spinners or fiber mills than the grays with the spots?
I guess I am just trying to understand the preference for no spots.
I was at a show last year with a classic tux gray. IMO and the opinion of others she should have ran away with a blue, but she had a big black spot, which was color checked and measured by the checkers. Had that spot been 6 inches or larger(it was 3) she would have shown in pattern or multi. Why would that be, she was clearly gray she would have stood out like a sore thumb in those classes.



Susan,

Spots are not desirable in the show ring. In grays however they are "tolerated". I can't remember a gray being marked down, and can even think of color champions with huge black or red patches.

Solid colored animals with spots are a different story. They probably shouldn't be, but I can think of several judges who have campaigned for spots to be major faults in placement.

The thinking seems to be that variation in fleece color is bad for commercial fiber production, and if there are spots there is bound to be "contamination" throughout the blanket. In reality (in my herd at least) spots are not at all correlated with color contamination. When we process our fleeces, we just pluck the spots out.

Neil

Neil Padgett
A Paca Fun Farm
Dickerson,MD
mpcpneilp@gmail.com
www.apacafunfarm.com
APacaFunFarm Posted - 08/05/2011 : 12:04:51 AM
quote:
Originally posted by bobvicki

quote:
Do you really think that solid fawn, brown, or even black is any more consistent that gray?

Un-dyed color will all be processed the same way. 1000+ pounds will be picked and carded in a single batch. That batch's color will be unique....quite different than other batches of fawn, brown, black, or gray.

So a color run will have to have a batch number, similar to the way wall paper is marked. When you want to do a room right you make sure that all rolls carry the same batch number so pattern and color matches! Sounds like a pretty easy way to make using natural color fabric more popular on a commercial basis.

Bob



Not only is it easy Bob, it's the only way it could be done.

Alpaca myth number 5347 (or whatever)...........only white can be grown for consistent color lots....... First of all there are many shades of white (try matching the whites in your herd with Pantone (sp?) reference colors). Second, different whites will take dye differently. Even white will have to be processed in batches if you want real color consistency.

Neil


Neil Padgett
A Paca Fun Farm
Dickerson,MD
mpcpneilp@gmail.com
www.apacafunfarm.com
bobvicki Posted - 08/04/2011 : 11:10:38 PM
quote:
Do you really think that solid fawn, brown, or even black is any more consistent that gray?

Un-dyed color will all be processed the same way. 1000+ pounds will be picked and carded in a single batch. That batch's color will be unique....quite different than other batches of fawn, brown, black, or gray.

So a color run will have to have a batch number, similar to the way wall paper is marked. When you want to do a room right you make sure that all rolls carry the same batch number so pattern and color matches! Sounds like a pretty easy way to make using natural color fabric more popular on a commercial basis.

Bob

Bob & Vicki Blodgett
Suri Land Alpaca Ranch
3288 Halter Avenue
Newton, Iowa 50208
641-831-3576
alpaca@iowatelecom.net
www.alpacanation.com/suriland.asp
JimR Posted - 08/04/2011 : 3:27:17 PM
So than Neil, is it just for the shows that they give a higher mark to solid blankets,(I was told if everything else is equal in choosing between 2 gray alpacas, the one without spots will win in the ring) and really has no higher value or is more in demand by spinners or fiber mills than the grays with the spots?
I guess I am just trying to understand the preference for no spots.
I was at a show last year with a classic tux gray. IMO and the opinion of others she should have ran away with a blue, but she had a big black spot, which was color checked and measured by the checkers. Had that spot been 6 inches or larger(it was 3) she would have shown in pattern or multi. Why would that be, she was clearly gray she would have stood out like a sore thumb in those classes.



Susan Rempe
Four Corners Alpacas
Bloomfield NM
River11524@msn.com
www.AlpacaNation.com/fourcorners.asp
APacaFunFarm Posted - 08/04/2011 : 2:16:06 PM
quote:
Originally posted by Heidi Christensen

Eye appeal perhaps, but to me hand appeal is so much more important I was out at an extremely large farm last weekend. They had some beautiful grays, but I must say they were appeal-less to me because of the way their fiber felt. I know the quality has increased in the last couple years, but is it really plausible that a commercial mill would prefer to process a "true gray" opposed to a gray composed of black and white or brown and white? Don't thousands and thousands of pounds need to be produced? Is that really possible with the slow reproductive rate alpacas have and the "surprise" factor so often seen in breeding outcomes?

Heidi Christensen



Wow guys.......

Do you really think that solid fawn, brown, or even black is any more consistent that gray?

Undyed color will all be processed the same way. 1000+ pounds will be picked and carded in a single batch. That batch's color will be unique....quite different than other batches of fawn, brown, black, or gray.

Gray is really no different than any color in terms of commercial application.

Neil

Neil Padgett
A Paca Fun Farm
Dickerson,MD
mpcpneilp@gmail.com
www.apacafunfarm.com
Heidi Christensen Posted - 08/04/2011 : 1:50:22 PM
Eye appeal perhaps, but to me hand appeal is so much more important I was out at an extremely large farm last weekend. They had some beautiful grays, but I must say they were appeal-less to me because of the way their fiber felt. I know the quality has increased in the last couple years, but is it really plausible that a commercial mill would prefer to process a "true gray" opposed to a gray composed of black and white or brown and white? Don't thousands and thousands of pounds need to be produced? Is that really possible with the slow reproductive rate alpacas have and the "surprise" factor so often seen in breeding outcomes?

Heidi Christensen
WingNut Farm
Graham, Wa
(253) 846-2168
http://alpacanation.com/wingnutfarm.asp
http://wingnut-alpacas.com
JimR Posted - 08/04/2011 : 11:12:56 AM
I agree Ken commercial gray would be exciting, but I think all gray is exciting too, more than any other breeding I do, or have done in the past, I look forward to my gray breeding's, and next year my appy/harlequin breeding's (hoping they took)
I think if you asked most breeders, they aren't looking to sell tons of alpacas a year, just enough to make room so they can breed others, and cover expenses at least.
I see so many alpacas I would love to buy, the prices are just super, and they would really be good additions to my herd, but I am out of room.
That's why I wish there was a national(or private) fiber herd that could at least take some of the boys, even on a lottery basis to help free up room, which might get the herds "unlocked" so we could add and alpaca or two to our herds when we see something we really can't live without.
Just wishful thinking because I know people would start buying if they had room.
The only way to accomplish that at this point is to get new buyers interested. At this point even the tax incentive thing is looking good to me as a selling point. JMO of course

Susan Rempe
Four Corners Alpacas
Bloomfield NM
River11524@msn.com
www.AlpacaNation.com/fourcorners.asp
julieandken Posted - 08/04/2011 : 10:45:01 AM
I agree that the economy is hurting all sales now, but the prices bid and received for multis has always been low relative to solids. Traditional greys have always, including now, held their value because of "eye appeal"...although I don't know why they are valued higher than multis, since their appeal have always been there in "eye appeal" to hand spinners in particular.
I suspect that it is because the price of alpaca is more written into the animals breeding value than fiber value.
I also suspect that there will one day be several scales of commercial production, and that it will not just be white. There are magnificent fawn and brown animals capable of bringing undyed fiber to a large scale and they are a large part of the American herd. Blacks and greys are not too far behind. If one were able to make solid greys, both rose and silver and black, I would expect them to have the at least equal value, as breeding stock, as those fawns and browns.
I love traditional greys and have lots of them. I think that the issue, particularly for new breeders who one day expects to sell animals as breeding stock, is "what is my animal worth". Obviously, it's only as much as someone is willing to pay. It will be determined by fiber production needs at that time and is speculative.
Right now, there is a reason, at least in my mind, to hope that we can have a commercial grey. To me that's not boring, but quite exciting.


Ken
Kenneth M Rosenfeld MD
Mt Aukum, Ca
Renaissance Ridge Alpacas
www.renaissanceridgealpacas.com

Julie and Ken Rosenfeld, MD
Renaissance Ridge Alpacas
Mount Aukum, CA
www.renaissanceridgealpacas.com
530-620-7934
http://www.alpacanation.com/farmsandbreeders/03_viewfarm.asp?name=12721
JimR Posted - 08/04/2011 : 10:15:01 AM
I don't consider appys or grays with spots multi. I do know that there is a lot of interest in appys, they usually always sell.
But right now Ken nothing much is selling. Maybe because the summer has been so hot, I am not sure, but others I have spoken too all have said the summer has been very slow.
Is the reason for no spots a spinners issue? Or just because someone decided to breed spots out of tux grays to see if it can be done?
I hope it doesn't include rose grays because they have many varied shades of fiber, which turns out beautiful spun, that is usually the best selling color I have in yard. so I am not understanding why no spots is important. Isn't gray considered a cottage fiber color as opposed to white which can be mass produced and there is no varition in color.



Susan Rempe
Four Corners Alpacas
Bloomfield NM
River11524@msn.com
www.AlpacaNation.com/fourcorners.asp
julieandken Posted - 08/04/2011 : 09:19:06 AM
So whats a good multi herdsire selling for these days Susan?

Ken

Kenneth M Rosenfeld MD
Renaissance Ridge Alpacas
Mt Aukum, Ca
www.renaissanceridgealpacas.com

Julie and Ken Rosenfeld, MD
Renaissance Ridge Alpacas
Mount Aukum, CA
www.renaissanceridgealpacas.com
530-620-7934
http://www.alpacanation.com/farmsandbreeders/03_viewfarm.asp?name=12721

Alpaca Forum at AlpacaNation © 2000 - 2009 AlpacaNation LLC Go To Top Of Page
Snitz Forums 2000

alpacas for sale

alpacas for sale

AlpacaNation Home | Member Login | About AN | Contact Us | Join AlpacaNation

Conditions of Use | Privacy Notice   Copyright © 2000-2013 AlpacaNation LLC  All Rights Reserved.