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June/July 2010 Arcady CORINTHIAN continues to produce almost all female crias in his first full drop - so far 9 females and only 2 males. Pretty good stats ! Sales of pregnant females have been very solid and we might run out of females available for sale soon ! Our intermediate male, Arcady FORMIDABLE! (aka Darbi) continues to impress as he matures. His fleece has a very rich handle with great lustre and crimp throughout his solid dark grey (roan). We can't wait for late 2010 or early 2011 when we can start trying him with matings. Look out for this son of Hope Downs El Gordo and Murrumbung Antoinette. Enjoying the planned 2010 'getaways' from the farm and recently spent a great week living in Sydney's city heart near Chinatown and doing lots of those 'must do' things in Sydney. Highlights ? Doing the Harbour Bridge Climb (with surprisingly little vertigo !) and seeing the musical 'Wicked' in the wonderful old Capitol Theatre (it has to be seen to be believed !) Touring the replica vessel HMB Endeavour and the retired Oberon class submarine, HMAS Onslow, was also a wonderful experience, and what a contrast they were ! June was a very dry month, however, we have excellent paddock feed after the autumn rain and having nursed the best paddocks through summer. Fat, happy animals. 2 weeks touring NSW. Delivered an animal, visited friends near Braidwood and spent time in Tamworth, reviewing the equine facilities where the AAA National Show will be held this year. HUGE ! is my first reaction. Not sure how we will fill it will alpacas and people - fear we might rattle about. Happened to catch a superb competition with Australian Cutting Horses. Had never seen these working before and spent a very interesting afternoon watching and chatting with experienced cutting horse people. Also made an excursion to see the facilities at New England Fibre Testing P/L in Walcha. Had a fantastic day with Tim and Sue happily showing me how the testing process works with alpaca fleece etc. This is a high quality, professional outfit of international standing. Also had a delicious lunch in local cafe and saw the sights - Walcha and New England are very scenic - well worth the trip. Beware ! It can get very cold in winter with minimums to -10C or less ! Discovered Dubbo Op Shops are cheaper than Mt Barker ! Checked out 'The Dish' on the way down to Parkes. It looks just like all of its photos ! The cafe there makes delicious beef and red wine pies on site. Highly recommended if you are 'in the area' ! May 2010 Very busy with matings. Spraying pasture to control broadleaf weeds. April 2010 Arcady PAUA's first cria was born on April 20th and is an even light to medium silver grey male from a white-faced, vicuna-shaded medium brown. A good result. Also born on April 20th was a real surprise ! An appaloosa male cria sired by Arcady Corinthian (SW) and from Arcady Ooh-la-la! (Roan). To say that this result was unexpected is an understatement. These animals must be reading our website ! Soon to be named Appaloosa FAUX PAS (he's from the 'French' family) watch out for this little guy's picture. His fleece is brilliantly lustrous and hanging in moppy bundles all over. Our Appaloosa stud male, Peerless MARLECCHINO, arrived on the 12th and is now available for stud duties. 'Marle' is a strongly-muscled, mid-sized male with a generous patterning of medium fawn spots. He is already a proven producer of appaloosa crias. Check him out on our Stud Males' page. March 2010 Arcady Corinthian continues to produce beautiful female crias. Establishment of our new, parallel herd, named Appaloosa Alpacas. Watch for more exciting developments and additions here. December 2009 A beautiful addition to our appaloosa herd - Arcady LILLYPILLY, female cria born from Arcady Tiger Lily on December 9th. June 2009 Light silver stud male prospect - Arcady PAUA Arcady Paua is shaping as our next young silver grey stud male. He has his first female spitting off from a test mating at only 19.5 months of age. Paua has had a succesful show career so far with 2 X 2nd places as Junior and 3 X 1st placings as Intermediate (including Royal Melbourne Show 2008) in his 2nd fleece. He is an immaculate pale silver, pretty much the perfect colour. His sire is also a light grey, not quite silver, not quite rose, Bumble Hill Shillac. His dam, Arcady Perlina, is also an immaculate pale silver and has superb silver genetics, being by Arcady Voodoo (also immaculate pale silver !) and a granddaughter of Hope Downs El Gordo (another light silver) and Bodeguero Mystique (yet another light silver). Look out for Paua at stud from Spring 2009. Check out his pics and details on our Stud Males' page. May 2009 Whilst the main thrust of the alpaca breeding industry in Australia will quite rightly continue to be the development of exquisite alpaca fleece, the National herd, and the Industry in general, is now large enough and mature enough to ~ EXPLORE THE CONCEPT OF DUAL PURPOSE ALPACAS ~ Alpacas for meat and fleece. This is a fairly new concept in Australia and one which might appeal to the more broadacre or specialist commercial farmer. In late 2008 we selected our first Arcadian alpaca for slaughter. Alpaca meat is very beautiful eating .... lean, tender and mild-flavoured. It cooks up somewhere between lamb and veal and takes spices very well. Our local butcher, Tim Noske from Hahndorf, whose business did the slaughter and butchering for us, was very impressed with the quality of the meat, declaring that "If you didn't know, you would think it was veal". Within the significant alpaca herd that exists nationally within Australia, it is now possible to identify individuals or bloodlines which lend themselves to the production of fast-growing, early-maturing animals very suitable for meat production and the possibility exists to selectively breed to further enhance these traits.
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