Friday, March 18, 2011

Pocket and Jasper- 2 weeks

     Today Pocket and Jasper have been here two weeks. So far they are doing great, they are happy members of the herd. Uncle Andy is basically in charge of them, they follow him around and do whatever he says. He eats with them their extra meals a day, I estimate he'll weigh roughly 200 lbs. by the time they are healthy. He was a bit on the porky side to begin with, so he'll have to be cut off soon.

     Today was weight day. I don't have a livestock scale, so I pick them up and stand on a bathroom scale. The only hard part of this is actually reading the dial, which is not only way down below, but also obscured by an alpaca. This is also why I tend to stop tracking weight after they hit 100 lbs. 

     So first up was wee Pocket, who weighed 60 lbs. two weeks ago. Last time they both lay limply to be picked up and weighed, then walked off when they were done.

     This time Pocket was way more interested in the scale then anything else. It took quite some doing to get him balanced and both of us onto the scale. He was hanging his head down, twisted as far as he could and wiggling against me, to see this cool white square. 

     "What is that?"
     "Move your head I can't read the dial."
     "I'll read it for you, put me closer."
     "You can't read it, move your head."
     "Of course I can, I used to do this all the time," he pushed against me so he could touch it with his nose and about sent up both tumbling over.
     "You've never seen one before, you don't know what it is, move your head." I leaned back enough to pull him around.
     "It's a dial, duh, put me closer," he pushed forward off me again.
     "It's a scale you liar, you don't know. Stop this, you're going to knock us over."
     "I was being specific, and you are obviously our problem. Lean me closer."
     Thus our conversation went until I managed to wrangle an arm around his head and hold him that way. In the end Pocket weighs between 63-65 lbs. depending where in the wiggle he was so I'm calling it 64 lbs. and being happy.

     Jasper weighed 65 lbs. two weeks ago. He calmly let me lead him to the scale, and pick him up, then began howling and whining in the high-pitched alpaca wail. I quickly jumped on the scale, looked down, and he weighed 95 lbs. I got off the scale, and found Pocket standing proudly behind us. I pushed Pocket off the scale, picked up Jasper, who immediately resumed his screeching, and got back on the scale. I contorted myself to look down, and saw the top of Pockets head, where he began swearing to me who knew exactly how to work one of these things. Added my own screeching at that point.

     Got Pocket off the scale and out the door, picked up Jasper, who continued to wail, and turned to find Jodi and Pixie now standing on the scale. Have I mentioned alpacas are curious to a fault and love novel objects?

     Put all the alpacas in the stall, tracked down Jasper who is now avoiding me and refusing to be led. So I picked him up and carried him across the stall, wailing all the way, and got back on the scale. 71 lbs. 

     Coming next week- How to train alpacas to stand on a bathroom scale.  

 

2 comments:

  1. Love it and love you...you are the best!!!!

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