Along Came Eva. Abandoned at Birth.

         

Well she was a mystery and remains so. Alpacas average around 342 days of pregnancy for a spring baby (a baby alpaca is called a cria) and a winter baby might be less at 335 days. Eva's mother, well there are 2 possibilities but the favourite to have been her mother was pregnant just 118 days meaning Eva would have been quite premature. I know this because the male didn't arrive on the farm until September 2nd the year before. The other option to have been the mother did not breed with the new male and wouldn't go near him however I did have a small sickly male that none of the Alpacas would go near for over 2 years. Maybe, just maybe one of the female did breed with him prior to him being found a new home.  

Further to the likely mother I do know the favoured one did sit for the male (alpacas have sex sitting down) and she did have some little signs of after birth but she didn't want anything to do Eva and left her to wander the paddock which is where I found her. Very, very, healthy and alert and hungry. I rounded all the mothers up and put them in the barn with Eva to see if any would own up to her, or Eva would identify  her mum but to no avail. 

A dash to the vet to see what options there was for the, quite rare occurrence, of an abandoned cria at birth and the only option for the first crucial days of building immunity and getting some colostrum into her was to use some left over camel plasma. Being a weekend there was no way to get any other form of colostrum quickly so it would be the camel plasma and a generic animal formula of powdered milk. 

Adding to Eva's mystery there were no sign of a premature birth and she was vibrant, continually hungry and full of energy. Here is how I learned to feed her and I made a video for anyone else in this situation Click here, feeding Eva  

Four feeds a day and one each night Eva flourished, she lived with my dogs most of the time and they accepted and protected her and became her brothers as the other alpacas would not accept her although I tried every day. No surprise Eva also became part of my family with some extra privileges. 

At writing this Eva is now 3 weeks old, you can follow her on Instagram at evaalpaca or she has her own hashtag #evaalpaca 

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