Alpaca

Tuesday, October 17, 2006

As part of the foliage tour my group took, we visited an alpaca farm. Believe it or not, an alpaca costs about $20,000. and the value of the animal isn't its coat. You also have to have 2 alpacas as they don't do well solo. They were curious, running up when we entered the pen, but didn't like sudden movements. The alpacas especially were drawn to the children in the group. Now I didn't know they could spit, but thankfully they didn't while we were in the pen. Thanks to my friend Marge Smith, here's some info on the critters: "Not all alpacas spit, but all are capable. While occasionally the projectile contains only air and a little saliva, the alpaca often bring up and project regurgitated stomach contents...
Spitting is mostly reserved for other alpacas, not for humans, but sometimes a human gets in the line of fire. If an alpaca is extremely displeased at a human, that person may well become covered in smelly, green goo...
For alpacas, spitting results in what is called "sour mouth." Sour mouth is characterized by a loose-hanging lower lip and a gaping mouth. This is caused by the stomach acids and unpleasant taste of the contents as they pass out of the mouth.
Some alpacas will spit when looked at, others will never spit — their personalities are all so individualized that there is no hard and fast rule about them in terms of social behavior." :) Carol