Cria and Goat Update

Sorry its been awhile (again) since I posted but I've been super busy around the ranch and keeping up with the auction for my niece on Facebook.

I wanted to share some additional photos of the little Nigerian Dwarf goat kids I got recently. These little guys were both born in April so they are a little over three months old now.

This is Gladiator

And this is Darrel

They LOVE to climb and jump on things. I put this ramp up to the top of their house and they love to run up it and then jump off and run back to do it again and again and again.

Today when I went out to check on things, I found the two of them curled up sleeping in the shade on top of the chicken run. Darrel was asleep on the tarp at one end and Gladiator was curled up sleeping on board that I have sitting on top of the run to protect the opening into the chicken coop from rain. Unfortunately I didn't have my camera with me and as soon as they realized I was outside, they woke up and jumped off, running to me to say hello. They follow me everywhere like little puppies. They even wag their tails like a dog! They really are very cute. Sometimes annoying...but cute.

And here are some updated photos of Phoenix and Rosie. They are grazing while Rosie's momma, Minnie Pearl, is resting.

And here is Phoenix with his half sister Dazzle (they have the same dam) drinking out of a puddle after the rain.

And here is Rosie, posing for me. I finally managed to get several great photos of her standing still!! We are more and more impressed with Rosie every day. She has such incredible fiber and the color is awesome. Her personality is absolutely precious. We just love her!

We should have at least one more cria in late September/early October. Dazzle is bred to our silver ALSA Halter Champion, Tempis Fugit.

 

Sorry, she was very busy eating and drinking!

Happy Memorial Day Weekend!

I want to wish everyone a relaxing, safe and fun Memorial Day weekend! What do you do to celebrate the official start of Summer? Do you go camping? Do you have a cookout on the patio or deck? Share your special way of celebrating this weekend.

We don't have anything special planned for this weekend. We were supposed to be attending and exhibiting at a llama show but the show was canceled due to the outbreak of EHV-1 (equine herpes virus). The show was canceled as a cautionary measure so that exposure to the camelids was reduced. So we have an unexpected "free" weekend!

We plan to set up our smoker and smoke a chicken, a cornish game hen and a couple of hugs slabs of Alaskan Salmon. We'll have enough meat to last the entire weekend without having to cook every day.

Tomorrow we'll probably start shearing llamas and trim toenails as needed. Then we'll relax the rest of the weekend and enjoy our time off.

And I have new rose bushes to get planted. I bought these a couple of weeks ago at Lowe's for only $5!

To help kick off summer and to celebrate the long holiday weekend, I'm having a sale in my ArtFire store! Use the coupon code Memorial 10Off to receive 10% off everything in the store!

Visit SplitRockRanch's Studio

SAVE 10.00 % On
All Items

Use Coupon Code:

MEMORIAL10OFF

during checkout.

Holiday Decorations

My Fleeces are Back from the Mill!! Llama Rovings Now Available!

Several months ago I sent three fleeces to the mill to be processed into roving. I sent a first shearing fleece from our gorgeous silver/gray male, Tempis Fugit. This fleece has been sitting in my studio for a few years, waiting for me to decide what to do with it. It was extremely clean, ultra-soft and an incredible silver/gray color.

Here is a photo of Tempis Fugit - he has earned enough Grand Champion awards at halter to earn his ALSA Halter Champion award!

 

And here is a photo of his first shearing rovings

I also sent in Tempis Fugit's second shearing fleece. It processed into a similar roving that is slightly darker and only slightly less fine than the first shearing.

These rovings are available for sale. I will probably hold back at least one bump of the first shearing for my personal spinning stash. The rest is offered at $4.50/oz for the first shearing fiber and $4.00/oz for the second shearing fiber.

The first shearing fiber bumps are as follows:

8.3 oz = $37.35

10 oz = $45.00
10.6 oz = $47.70

I have an 11.6 oz bump in stock but I think that is the one I will hold back for my own stash.

The second shearing fiber bumps are as follows: (all prices are plus shipping/handling)

8.2 oz = $32.80

10.8 oz = $43.20
12.1 oz = $48.40

I had some gorgeous rich dark chocolate brown rovings available from a first shearing of Primoris Filius (First Son in latin - he is Tempis Fugit's first son) but that fiber sold quite quickly. I'm going to share a photo of the llama and the fiber though, because it is so gorgeous!

Here is Primoris Filius aka Fil after shearing

And the bumps of his first shearing roving

Reflecting on a Llama Legend

Okay, so Midnight Hour probably isn't a legend in the rest of the world but in our world he was quite the man! I have been thinking over the past few days since Midnight passed away, trying to remember all of his offspring and who has them now. We only used him as a stud 9 times and got 6 females and 3 males. Only one of those males is still intact, the other two have been gelded. All of his daughters have been sold - leaving us with only one male out of Midnight Hour, Kemui Yama. Kemui has already started following in his sire's footsteps in the show ring. He took first place in his class, Grand Champion in his Division and Reserve Best in Show the first time we showed him.

So, a walk down memory lane - Midnight Hour's offspring:

Midnight Kachina

Mustang Sally

Midnight Rhapsody

 

Caballero Rojo (Red)

 

Gypsy Rose

Midnight's Amazing Grace

Midnight Moonbeam

 

Midnight's Kemui Yama

Another Llama Goes to a New Home!

Last Thursday morning I got a call from someone interested in one of our male llamas. They were interested in Duke of Pearl, who will be 7 towards the end of August. Duke is a bit of a challenge. He was born several weeks after Jim had his last heart attack and then Jim was involved in an auto accident that December. He was hit from behind at a stop light by a 3/4 ton pickup fleeing the scene of another accident. The accident tore the L4 and L5 vertebrae in Jim's lower back so he was unable to do any llama wrangling for quite some time. Therefore, when the time came for Duke to be weaned and halter trained we were unable to do much more than get a halter on him and lead him to the little boy's pasture. Years went by before Jim felt up to attempting to do much with the llamas so by the time we finally got a halter on Duke again he was a full grown adult full of testosterone. Duke loves to "stir the pot" with the other adult males and he is often the instigator of most of the tussles between the males. So, we priced Duke extremely reasonably but stressed that we would not sell him to first time llama owners. This woman's husband was on a business trip to Boston but they found Duke on our website and fell in love with him. Her husband wanted "a challenge" - hmmm, seemed like the perfect fit!

Duke at weaning

So, last Thursday morning I got up and got chores done and got Duke sorted into a catch pen then had Jim catch him for me. I can usually handle the smaller and tamer llamas all by myself but the tall ones that you really have to reach up to get the halter on I need help. I'm also leery of having the llamas step on my left foot because I don't want to re-injure the broken foot again.

Duke as a yearling

Duke had never been sheared so his fiber was extremely long but amazingly clean of debris. When I sheared him I was shocked to see that he was a gorgeous rose gray and silver color! His fleece has matted tips but I'm going to cut the tips off and that will leave the rest of the fleece the perfect length for spinning and it is sooo soft and such a fabulous color.

Duke was very well behaved and he went home with his new owner that afternoon. I haven't heard from them yet as to how Duke is doing but I am fairly certain that if there was a problem I would have heard about it. They plan to train Duke to pack. Their current llamas are over 15 years old so its time to put a younger boy to work. Go Duke!

Duke after shearing

I have been AWOL - Sorry!

I am so sorry that I haven't posted anything in almost two weeks! It has been so crazy busy here lately that I just haven't had the time or energy to put up a new post and some days I haven't even been able to get through all my emails.

This is going to be a hodge-podge post of what is on my spinning wheel and what is next in the spinning queue, llamas, foster kittens, etc.

Here is what is on my spinning wheel right now - Zinnias colorway on merino roving by Spinningawesomegood on Etsy. I split the roving into thinner strips and separated those strips into approximately equal weight halves that I will spin on two bobbins and then ply together to allow the bright colors to fall where they may - it should be a vibrant yarn!

Next up is a custom dyed superwash BFL roving that I dyed for a customer who wants to make socks out of the finished yarn. I don't have any photos of the colorway but it is in shades of Burgundy, Russet, Gold Ochre and Olive. It will be spun onto two bobbins and plyed to allow the colors to fall where they may and blend together throughout the length of yarn.

Then I have a custom order to spin the following roving - a merino/tencel roving that I dyed in my India Spices colorway. This yarn should have incredible drape and luster to it!

We have sheared a few more llamas in the past couple of weeks but our schedule has not allowed us to shear as many as we would have liked and we are quickly running out of time to get them sheared. I don't like to shear any later than mid-July because we start getting snow early (last year we got our first snow on the last day of summer) and we can get snow into May so I want to be sure that the llamas have enough fiber growth before the cold weather and snow hits.

We sold another llama this past weekend. This is Midnight's Amazing Grace - these photos are from when she was a yearling and she has grown a LOT but I don't have more recent photos to share. We sheared her for her new owners so she will be nice and cool at her new home. She has been reunited with her mother and one of her sisters at her new home so she is very happy where she is at now.

And I can't resist sharing a photo of Grace when she was a cria - sorry but her momma's behind is in the photo, not her best side!

And, no, that isn't dirt on Grace, she had gray on her face, legs and down the center of her back when she was young!

The foster kittens are growing like crazy and are slowly getting better adjusted to being around people and the dogs and other cats. They should be ready to be spayed and neutered within the next couple of weeks and ready for adoption to their new furever homes. Jellybean has been dubbed "dangerously cute" by our daughter, who has nicknamed Jellybean "The Geiger Tiger" because she purrs constantly!

Uncle Munchkin with Barbie, Kenny and Jellybean. Krissy was sleeping in the cube instead of in the tub with the rest of the crew. They love sleeping on the bags of wool!

So, that's some of what we've been up to lately. How is everyone else's summer going?!

Black Pearl has a new home!

Last Sunday some of our customers came to the ranch and brought two females they recently purchased from us so we could shear the girls and then breed them to our males. I did a modified lion cut on both of the girls. I usually only shear the barrel section but it is much hotter where they live now so I sheared the barrel and most of their back legs. They are so much cooler now!

While they were here, our customers/friends were looking at our young male llamas and fell in love with Black Pearl. I had barrel sheared him on Saturday in case some other prospective buyers might be interested in him (which they weren't - but now I know why I needed to shear him). Black Pearl is out of Minnie Pearl who consistently produces extremely sweet and easy to handle crias. He has always loved to give little llama kisses through the fence. When he started giving kisses on Sunday, they fell in love with him and wanted to take him home.

Here is Black Pearl after shearing - he has gone to a wonderful loving home where they are already referring to him as their "main man".

Congratulations and thank you Whispering Spirit Ranch!

SOLD - Congratulations & Thank You Whispering Spirit Ranch!

This past Saturday we sold two llamas to some wonderful customers who are just getting started on their llama journey. They bought three of our male llamas last Fall (Midnight Hour: ALSA ROM and multiple Grand & Reserve Grand Champion and Top 10 at Grand Nationals two years in a row - Argentum: a show quality silver male by our ALSA Halter Champion Tempis Fugit out of our best producing female Winona Wildfire - Chocolate Chip: the cutest little loud appaloosa cria we've ever had here on the ranch, you've all surely seen photos of Chip here on the blog!) They selected two females from our herd: Tender is the Night and Charisma. Both of these girls are sweet as can be and enjoy back rubs, chin scratches and eagerly nibble little treats out of your hand.

This is Tender is the Night

And this is Little Rock Charisma

Charisma is one of only two Black Jack daughters in our herd. Charisma's last cria was Shimmering Sands, a gorgeous miniature suri male with rose gray fiber. Charisma and Tender is the Night will both be coming back to Split Rock Ranch late this Spring to be sheared and to be bred to one of our males so they should have beautiful crias for their new owners by late next Spring.

Congratulations and thank you to Whispering Spirit Ranch! We appreciate your business and your friendship and look forward to helping you on your exciting llama journey.

Blue Denim Wrangler Sold & Delivered

Yesterday was a bittersweet day. We sold Blue Denim Wrangler almost two years ago but his new owners were unable to accept delivery for a variety of reasons and we finally delivered him to his new home yesterday.

Blue is a Mesquite son (we sold Mesquite last summer) out of our silver female Minnie Pearl. Blue is so laid back and sweet and easy going; I can walk up to him in the pasture and hug him, scratch his back and pat him. He loves to beg for treats. The new owners have two gorgeous silver/gray females that they are going to breed to Blue and the crias should be absolutely stunning.

Here is Blue as a cria. Can you see why we named him Blue?!

 

The photo above was taken when Blue was weaned.

The photo below was taken in June 2008 after Blue was sheared last.

And here is what Blue's sheared fleece looks like.

 

I had a waiting list for Blue's fleece. If I had kept Blue, I could have sold his fleece every shearing until he passed away and still not have made it through the list of people wanting one of his fleeces.

I'm happy that Blue is going to be used as a stud; he'll enjoy his new job and I cannot wait to see how his crias turn out! But when I started up the truck yesterday, Blue watched us pull away and he had a look on his face that seemed to say "HEY, wait! You forgot me!" I couldn't watch in the side mirrors as we left... Love you Blue.

WW

Looking back...

Looking back...and Forward

This is a great time of year to look back on the past year and reflect on things. Let's face it, there are things that go right and things that go...well, not so right, for all of us. I choose to believe that there is a silver lining in everything and try to remember to look hard for that silver lining when things "head south". Sometimes it isn't until much later that we look at something that happened and say to ourselves "wow, good thing that happened because if it didn't I would have...or wouldn't have..." and something good eventually came out of that event.

This past year we didn't have any crias (llama babies) born here at Split Rock Ranch. The last cria born here at the ranch was Hot Shot in September 2008. We exposed several of our females to males in the Fall of 2008 but none of them took, which is probably a good thing since our winter weather started on the last day of summer this year and those babies weren't due until several weeks later. (See, there's one of those silver linings!)

This past year we sold more llamas than we ever have before. We sold two females and four males. (We sold all of the crias shown in the photo above.) One of the males was our daughter's so he doesn't even really count because he isn't even on the books here at the ranch, but that makes almost 17% of the herd sold! Our goal is to get back down to 25 llamas so we have a better chance of getting all the llamas halter trained and most of our males pack trained. It also helps cut down on the feed bill, which is a good thing in this economy.

My fiber sales were down this year compared to 2008 but with the economy the way it has been, that was really no surprise and I've heard that sales were down for most fiber artists this year. That's okay though because it has allowed me to have some down time and more time to knit, crochet and spin.

My custom orders this past year were the best I've ever had though, so that thrilled me. Again, slower sales otherwise allowed me the time to really throw all of myself into the custom orders when they came in.

We showed several llamas this year. We didn't show at all in 2008 because we needed a break after earning our Halter Champion award for Tempis Fugit in 2007 and our daughter's senior year in high school was 2007-2008 and there was so much going on.  We did extremely well at the one and only show we attended in 2009. Kemui Yama took first place Adult Medium Wool Male, Grand Champion Medium Wool Male and Reserve Grand Champion Best in Show. He had never been sheared, groomed or trailered prior to the show so we were very proud of how well he handled everything. Decorus Domina (Baby Dee) took first place Adult Medium Wool Female and Reserve Grand Champion Medium Wool Female (second only to the Grand Champion Best in Show Female). Again, Dee had never been groomed or trailered prior to the show (I sheared her as a yearling but didn't groom her out).

And, this is the perfect time of year to look forward to the new year and set goals for ourselves and our business. Personally, I don't ever make any new year's resolutions for myself but I do try to reflect and learn from the past so I can set a better course for the next year.

In 2010 I would like to spend more time working with fiber and less time at the computer. I can eat up hours sitting here blogging, surfing the web, checking my Twitter and Facebook accounts, playing on-line games, etc.

I would like to sell at least 6 llamas again this year (we already have 3 llamas on reserve for somebody so we're already half way there!)

I want to spend more time working with the llamas and training the young ones to lead well and the adults to pack. I want to choose one male llama and start training him for performance so I can enter the performance classes at the LOCC Fall Show on Labor Day weekend this year.

I want to spend more time working with my horse, Maggie Mae, and start riding her this year. Maggie is a fabulous horse and she isn't the one with issues; I am. I took a bad fall from Tango in October of 2004 and have huge confidence and fear issues I need to overcome. I may enlist the help of a trainer this year, we'll see.

So, those are my goals for 2010. I will add to them as needed and alter as I see fit, depending on how things are going.

What are your goals for 2010?