Alpacas

Gerry,

With a bit of luck, we might be about to get that "little place in the country" with an acre of so of land.

Aside from the bees, I've expressed an interest in eating everything else that we might place on that land, which has not endeared me to the Mrs. My questions to you are:

• Are Alpacas tasty?
• How many would you need for them to be self sustaining financially? (including and excluding sausages)

Neil

If eating is your priority then maybe sheep or pigs might be a better option!

An acre might be a challenge to make an alpaca business work. Economies of scale and all that. More ground = more animals = less cost per unit.

You can eat them and a few eat spare males but there isn't the culture of eating them yet in this country. As to how they taste - I wouldn't know!

The fleece is the thing with alpacas - amazing stuff! But to get breeding stock with the best fleece isn't cheap. A couple of gelding quality males with good fleece isn't too expensive though.

Cheers, Gerry

Pigs are great - had two weaners this summer - went off to the abattoir a couple of weeks ago. You must have at least two as they are sociable animals and an acre is plenty. Meat is great and we have a freezer full and a large ham will be cured for Christmas. They are great fun to have around, very quick and intelligent, want to know what is going on. Downside is the paper work and you cant feed them kitchen scraps now since Mad Cow etc. Costs - well it will always be cheaper to buy from Lidl but with your own you will know they have had a happy life and not filled up with growth hormones or whatever. Plus they are contained and don't make the mess like free range hens. Great for clearing scrub land I can give you more info re costs if you pm me. We are going to do it again next year

How did your bees and pigs get along together, Bridget?
Kitta

The bees were about 10ft from the end of the pigs enclosure and they took no notice of each other. No probs at all.



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