Comments on: More to Nutrition than Hay

By: pacablogger

pacablogger — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 23:43:37 +0000

Norway! I’ve always wanted to visit there.
In Colorado, we have a broad range of climates. Where I am happen to be is more similar to the foothills because I’m at 7000 feet altitude. Down in the plains, it’s drier, hotter, sunnier, and windier. But it does sound very similar to what you describe. Especially now – it’s -12C right now and snowing. We’ll probably have snow on the ground until April.

I’m not sure what’s going on with the comments. I’ll have to dig around on wordpress. My settings look fine and open to subscription. Hmmnnn…

By: Rolf Barbakken/Knapper Alpakka

Rolf Barbakken/Knapper Alpakka — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 16:46:31 +0000

Sounds like Colorado is a lot like Norway where I am
We barely have summer and winter is mostly dark. We can have +30C in summer and -30C in winter, and enough snow to prevent any alpaca from moving around.

Btw, I couldn’t confirm the subscription of comments (the checkbox called “Notify me of follow…” results in a confirmation email). When I try to do it by clicking on the link, I just end up at a login to WordPress.

By: pacablogger

pacablogger — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 14:15:10 +0000

Absolutely – the primary source should be hay or forage and everything else fills in the gaps. I should mention that here, grazing season is very short, sunlight is scarce in winter, and we tend to have deficiencies in selenium, zinc, and at my place, magnesium. Our hay tends to be overloaded in potassium. Everyone will be different and the “whole meal” has to be assessed and the animals’ needs at the life stage they are in.

Thanks for your comments!

By: Rolf Barbakken/Knapper Alpakka

Rolf Barbakken/Knapper Alpakka — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 13:03:38 +0000

I think that we need to look at what the alpacas are born to eat. Where they come from. They are used to pretty simple feed and shouldn’t need all the special feeds. In fact, the best alpaca breeders in the world hardly give the alpacas anything but hay and some extra pellets in winter.

We just give the alpacas hay in addition to what they graze in summer. We give them a ADE shot in the middle of winter (Dec) and some pellets with minerals. Nothing fancy. Approved by the most successful alpaca breeder in Australia, btw.

You should adjust the feeding to what they graze, though. In some parts of the world the alpacas have fiber blowouts (significant deterioation of the fiber quality) because of the land they graze on.