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Goat-load of new arrivals
CUTE new arrivals are brightening up the scene at farms in Sheffield!
Heeley City Farm has just welcomed a rare baby Golden Guernsey goat, while staff at Mayfield Alpacas, at Ringinglow, are celebrating the birth of their first baby alpaca of the season.
The ginger-coloured Golden Guernsey goat has been christened Gemini by workers in Heeley, and she's already proving popular with visitors young and old.
Jill Brookes, Heeley City Farm manager, said: "She's beautiful, really friendly - she likes people already. Goats are quite friendly anyway, and kids like small animals.
"We've called her Gemini because that's the star sign she's born in. We're calling them all star signs at the moment, I'm not sure what we'll do when we run out of names!"
Gemini is bonding well with her alpaca mum, Angel, three.
"It's the first time she's had a baby," Jill said, adding the goat's dad Elvis, six, is being kept in the pen next door.
"He can look over and see her," she said.
The first documented reference to the Golden Guernsey breed dates from 1826, over a century before the goats were first exported to Britain from the Channel Islands in 1965.
Gemini has joined a vast menagerie of animals at Heeley City Farm, including sheep, horses, pigs, ducks, hens and geese.
The newest addition to Mayfield Alpacas' herd is Zac, who kept expectant farm workers waiting before being born two weeks later than his expected due date.
"He's only 12lb, he's quite a small alpaca," said Elaine Sharp, who owns the business at Quicksaw Farm, Ringinglow.
Just like Gemini, Zac was his two-year-old mum Zabel's first baby, and Elaine said any initial worries about the pair's relationship soon wore off.
"We thought at first she didn't really want to feed the baby, so we had to bring him and the mum in overnight so they could be in close contact with each other," she explained.
"At first she kept kicking him off, as if to say, 'I don't know what you are', but now she's quite happy, standing up and letting him feed.
"They're getting on quite well, and he's hopping around."
Elaine, who started breeding alpacas 13 years ago, said the farm is currently home to 65 of the long-necked creatures, and that 20 babies are due this summer.
"The first baby of the season is quite a special thing, though," she said.
Alpacas are native to the Andes and were first domesticated about 5,000 years ago. The animals come in different breeds - Zac is a Huacaya alpaca.
Female alpacas are referred to as Hembra and the males are called Macho.
All the alpacas at Mayfield are given Spanish names - Zac's dad is four-year-old Enrique.
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Thursday 09 February 2012
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