ALPACAS:
livestock
for your family,
investment for your future, and
the source of luxurious fashions known throughout the world!
Alpacas are
members of the camelid family. There are six different kinds of
camels, with different purposes. Some camels carry things or guard
flocks or sheep, while others produce soft and luxurious fleeces.
Today, the alpaca is found indigenously only in South America, with
highest population concentrations in the Andean regions of Peru,
Chile and Bolivia.
Fleeces of the vicuna and alpaca first captured the attention of
Incan royalty hundreds of years ago. Clothing for the royal family
and highest government officials was made exclusively from vicuna
and alpaca.
There are two types of alpacas: the huacaya, (pronounced "wah-KI'-ah"),
which has fleece with a waviness (crimp) that gives it a fluffy,
teddy bear like appearance, and the other type, the suri, which'
fleece has no crimp, so the individual fibers wrap around each other
to form lustrous pencil locks that hang down from the body.
Alpacas are raised for their very soft
fleeces, which are then transformed into luxurious finished
goods for "value-added" revenue generation. Sheared once a year,
each animal produces about five to twelve pounds of raw fleece.
How do you get started?
[Source: Alpaca Owners & Breeders Association]
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