Weather or not, clipping llamas is part of the May landscape, and this year the month is not cooperating. We went from premature summer, catapulting to 90 degrees then plummeting to consecutive days of morning frost. To clip or not to clip is not the issue; it centers on when. At least for this year, I do not have to agonize about taking things into my own hands. Tabitha, who clips camelids from Maine to Florida, and perhaps westward, has a blistering schedule, and I am happy to be on it. Perhaps sometime in the future, when I can not only pronounce but actually act on the retirement word, I will become more hands on. After all, didn't I clip my horses and my daughter's ponies for how many years.... Still, there is a difference between clipping horses and llamas for shows.
Then there's the decision of which kind of haircut. Saddle, saddle and thighs, or a full cut. My very heavily-coated dark Hershey Kiss llama this year is getting the full cut. I am not sure I will like how she looks afterwards, but at least this summer, she will be cooler. Silky white will get a saddle with thighs, my Sophisticated Lady (top image), a saddle only, and my soon-to-deliver mama llama probably a full cut.
Yesterday, in the rain, my wonderful crew of two cut the pasture, and it needed it. I never saw the girls happier than their cavorting and stulting about in 2.5 acres after they were released from 3 hours of confinement in the paddock. Today, when I arrived home, the girls were in the upper pasture, and across the road, near the pond were these avian nomads. I do love life on the farm, weather or not.Llamas
Farm Life
The Farm
Ducks
Geese
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