s e v e n i s a j o u r n e y

On Sunday we took a 2-hour drive up to Woodville to pick up Highland Heir (AKA Heir-y) to be our primary stud male for the season. He was supposed to have been shipped down via a horse transporter, but they flaked out. So we met Peter half way (they live in Hawkes Bay) and did the transfer in a gas station parking lot.

I’ve never stopped in Woodville before. The long line of wind turbines on the hills to the west is quite pretty.

Peter was quite impressed with the transport box we were assembling on the back of the ute- which is better than horrified considering we were loading their valuable stud male into it!

The addition of Heir-y has confused the herd distribution a bit. Heir-y cannot be in the same paddock as another intact male for safety reasons, as they can castrate each other when fighting. So now we have 3 mobs of alpaca (wethers plus heiry, all other males including Jim, females), plus the mob of horses. I am glad I have been building fences and subdividing the property. I still need to finish a few, and add some extensions to the water system (more troughs), then it will be even easier to manage this.

Startng this weekend we cue the bad 70′s buka-chika-wow music and have our first mating! Should be amusing, and hopefully successful. We have to remember to tell Heir-y “females only please!”