A friend let me ride along to watch the alpacas getting sheared at a local farm last week. The herd is part of a large complex that houses a preschool, herb gardens, and a fiber studio. I knew something about alpacas from our years in Colorado. It is not an inexpensive undertaking and great care must be taken to select, breed, and raise up the animals. Shearing too must be done professionally to save as much of the very dear fiber as possible.
A team from New Zealand did the shearing the day we were there. They brought each animal in by catching it and maneuvering it into the shearing shed on three legs. Then it was carefully laid on its side, shackled to cables, and pulled still to prevent getting cut by the shears.
While they had the opportunity, they filed any teeth in need and trimmed the hooves.
The shorn fleece was bagged (in paper potato sacks) and weighed. A small sample was numbered and bagged in little plastic bags to be sent off to Australia to get a micron count for each alpaca in the herd. There is noplace in the UK to have that done, so that's where it goes. Anything that goes to Australia just automatically seems much more exotic to me, as an American. : )
Fwiw, alpacas make a rather unearthly sound when they are unhappy and emerge from a shearing looking even more alien than before if possible. They did, however, take it all in stride. They made very little fuss and were off to pasture in no time.
