[Alpacasite] Re: Getting More People into the Alpaca Industry

Hi Patrick,

I agree that we should not paint an unrealistic picture of a "huggable
investment" -- but my work load doesn't look anything like the one you painted.

I feel the amount of time you need to spend working your farm is relevant to
the number of animals you have. When I first started, forty-five minutes in
the morning and fifteen minutes at night was the average time I spent. In
that time, I scooped poop twice a day, took care of monthly worming,
breedings, weighing cria, toenails, scrub all water buckets each day, restock hay
halter trained, behavior tested, delivered cria, fed them their grain sat in the
pastures, took lots of pictures, and so on. Granted, stringing fences,
planting pastures and building new barns are not included in the 1 hour per day.

I only had 6 animals with three on the way when we purchased our farm in
2000. Even when our numbers were up to 20 animals, the daily chores really
didn't average more than 2 hours per day.

Now, my daily chores take a bit longer - closer to 6 hours per day, but that
is with 100 animals. Again, that includes all we do -- meds, training,
birthing, breeding, behavior testing, heard health day with our vet, shearing,
farm visits, school field trips -- you name it.

As far as the paperwork & marketing side of things -- that is additional
time -- but really no more than a few hours per week.

When I first heard about alpacas, I spent a great deal of time researching
them, their needs, the industry and the tax benefits. I was a single parent
and my daughter was a sophomore at a College Prep School. College was right
around the corner and I was looking at raising what??? --- Alpacas???. I know
my daughter thought I was nuts. She has since graduated from college
without a student loan and now co-owns a few animals with me. Life is good.

My first purchase, one ten year old bred female, was about the same price as
my yearly salary -- but I felt I had done my homework and could make this
work. I still own that girl and she is still producing incredible offspring
each year.

Raising these amazing critters have enriched our lives and continue to do so
each day. I get up each morning and look forward to going to "work". I
don't think I use to say that when I worked in the corporate world.

Dreams do come true,

Barrie Lynn
Benchmark Alpacas at the Tin Roof Ranch
Ortonville - soon to be Goodrich, MI


In a message dated 11/28/2005 10:18:43 A.M. Eastern Standard Time,
patrickspastures@verizon.net writes:

In a message dated 11/28/2005 10:18:43 A.M. Eastern Standard Time,
patrickspastures@verizon.net writes:

Sue,

A new owner has to be prepared to go 3 to 5 years with little or no income
for sure.

This is not something that can we done in a bootstrapped method out of an
old doublewide.

I talked to a gentleman last night and bluntly told him that he needed a
minimum of $25k and more like $50 just to get started....this had to be
cash...not a line of credit or an attempt to get non existent bank financing.
Additionally, I told him to look for 50 hours of work a week...year around....hot
or cold.

These are very cute animals...but the cuteness can run out quickly if you
are under financed or over committed in time.

Painting a rosy picture of animals pronging and sweet smelling poop isn't
fair at all.

So, we are in violent agreement.

Jim Patrick
Patricks' Pastures Alpaca Ranch & Habitat
3030 N. Trinity Rd.
Denton, TX 76208

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

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