Learning about alpacas

[HHandbasket]

I am trying to learn about alpacas. My husband and I have been looking for a place in the country for a while, and today we were presented with an opportunity rent a home and work part-time as caretakers on a gorgeous alpaca ranch in the Sierra Nevada foothills!

Does anyone here keep alpacas? I have been doing a lot of reading and would love to hear more first-person experiences! We are so excited, we can hardly contain ourselves. I've always loved all animals, and this is just an opportunity that a couple of middle-agers like us were cut out for!

Thanks in advance for any comments, advice, and stories of alpacas.

 

[chicks & ducks]

Hi! Sorry for the late reply-I've been spending a lot of my time over at the sister site-backyardherds.com. You should definitely check them out!
We recently got 2 in tact male alpacas and they're great! We only wanted them for pets so fibre wasn't an issue for us so much as personality. So far they're very easy to take care of. They always go to the bathroom in the same spot(ours HAD to choose right in front of the gate! Annoying but handy come cleaning time). Ours eat hay and I just started offering them minerals this week. (ps I've read that they should NOT have alfalfa hay as it's too much protein and can affect their fibre). They need fresh water often and apart from that they're happy to just roam around! Ours will let us pet them(one more than the other) but generally they don't like it. They also don't groom much. There are some great topics over on the other board and there are also some great alpaca videos on youtube!

Hope that helps.