There is a lot of differing opinion on whether BEW should be bred or not. We know of at least one grand champion working sire in Australia who is BEW.
Whether a BEW is deaf or not is sort the luck of the draw, during fetal development. So a hearing BEW is no less BEW than a deaf one. There is not a defective gene that produces a BEW, it is a combination of the white spot from one parent and the merle or roan found in white faced greys (also known as tuxedo) from the other parent.
I have seen that, frankly, most people will agree that using a female BEW, deaf or not, as a breeder is perfectly fine, if she is paired with a dark solid colored male. And, people usually use a black male for a good chance of a grey cria. And, since BEW often do have very fine fleece, there is absolutely no reason not to use a BEW male as a breeder. I think most people in the US would not advise using a BEW male as a breeder, but this really makes no logical sense, if they are happy to use a BEW female as a breeder.
On our farm, we have a BEW female from a black dam with a white spot who we will breed, if we ever have the room in the pastures for more crias! And, we have a white son of a silver grey female, whose sire is white Victor's Vaccoyo. This male of ours has dark blue/grey eyes, not the bright white/sky blue eyes. We have used him as a sire and will do so again.
Heather
Heather Zeleny
White Lotus Alpacas
Oregon
Holistic Farm and Elite Fleece
On Jul 27, 2011, at 7:46 AM, jennymt1402002 wrote:
We just had our 5th cria born here on our farm. She is a beautiful white girl with bright blue eyes and we have researched this quite a bit and found that 80% of these type of crias are deaf. Sure enough she is deaf. She is outgoing and all the females watch out for her. Her mama has had 3 other crias before her. I wonder if anyone here has had this problem before and if so, do you think she will be good to breed her or just use for fiber?
Don't know anyone personally that has ever had this, just found online information.
Carla Terry
Country Home Alpacas
Mcpherson Kansas 67460
Message posts are the opinion of individuals posting and are not necessarily endorsed or approved by Yahoo! or the moderator of this group. The purpose of this discussion group is to ensure that all points of view can be aired. It is the responsibility of all individuals who post to treat others with respect and civility.
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home