Valorie is now bred to Flying Dutchman Alpacas Deacon Grey Silver BLADE (MSG) for a September 2023 cria. Can't wait to see what this combo brings! There's a good chance we will get a grey! EXCITED!
Valorie has our best alpaca, Vanora, as her mama and the beautiful bay black Grazing Hills Ephraim as her sire. She was bred to gorgeous Grazing Hills Hezekiah and had her first cria in June of 2020. We've been wanting a Hezekiah breeding for several years, to get those Running Late genetics on the farm--this has produced a gorgeous light fawn female, Joeleigh. Valorie is a very good mama, super laid back and calm. In 2022, she gave us JAXXON, one good-lookin' white male with gorgeous fleece.
Between her dam and sire, look at the genetics behind this female: Pperuvian Leon, Peruvian Hemingway, PPPeruvian Augusto, 4Peruvian Starr Khan, PPPeruvian Cahuide, Sunny Mesa's Tuscan Gold, Hemingway-Accoyo Nautilus, and Accoyo America Diomedes. Goodness!
Valorie is just a doll: a calm, sweet little beauty with absolutely crimpy, GORGEOUS apricot fleece and LOTS of it. Her mom, Vanora, has sheared 9 LBS. of 19 micron fleece for us in the past and Ephraim sheared a 4 LB. blanket at 10 months, so we expected that Valorie would have a very fine, but heavy-weight fleece. And she hasn't proved us wrong!
She is one of our smallest girls, but shears the heaviest fleece on the farm, while being a very fine fleece (17 micron).
In fact,
she has ONE OF THE HEAVIEST FLEECES IN THE NATION! 16 micron at 3 years! 17 micron at 4 years! Amazing! You don't usually see the combination of a fine micron (top 8% in the nation) with a heavy fleece weight (top 1%)!
2022 EPD results: TOP 9% AFD , value - 1.516, her cria will likely have a finer fleece
Ranked 36% for SDAFD, value - 0.162, her cria will likely have a more uniform fiber diameter
TOP 11% SF, value - 1.433, her cria will likely have a lower spin fineness
Ranked 32% for %F>30, value - 3.261, her cria will likely have a lower % of fibers greater than 30 micron
Ranked 75% for MC, value - 0.41, her cria will likely have a lesser frequency crimp than average
SDMC, value +.153, assesses the uniformity of curvature
Ranked 74% for %M, value +.42, her cria will likely have more % fiber medullation
However, "the full impact of medullation remains a question at this point in time" (quote from Yocom-McColl Fiber Labs).
TOP 2.5% MSL, value 3.895, her cria will likely have a longer staple length
TOP 0.27% FW, value 1.197, her cria will likely have a more heavy fleece weight.
In this characteristic she ranked 141 out of 53,247 animals in the EPD results! Fine, long, heavy = DENSITYBW, value 0.248 her cria will likely be a bit heavier for birth weight