About Alpacas

---

Originally from the Andes in South America, alpacas were so incredibly precious to the ancient Incan civilisation that they were used as currency because of the superb quality of their fleece. Indeed, alpaca fleece was exclusively worn by royalty because of its wonderful qualities and the Incans developed detailed and extensive breeding programmes. At the height of the Incan Empire, alpacas grew a far more uniform fleece and produced higher fibre yields than the best alpacas today.

When the Spanish conquistadors invaded in the early 17th century alpacas were driven to near extinction and many breeding systems and bloodlines were lost forever. Estimates suggest only 10% of the population remained and these remaining alpacas interbred with llamas so their valuable, superfine fleece has never quite been the same as it was for the ancient Incan royalty.

On the bright side, this means that we as a fibre producing industry have clear and achievable goals. By selectively breeding we are significantly decreasing the amount of llama in the genetics of our herd and are improving the quality of the fleece produced every year, approaching the quality of those original herds. The world outside South America is only just discovering the quality of alpaca fibre.

  Growing Demand

With the exception of the odd alpaca in a zoo here and there, alpacas were confined to South America until the mid to late 1980’s when the first imports of alpacas from Chile entered Australia and the US. The Australian and US alpaca industries are just now reaching commercial size. The 1990’s saw commercial quantities of alpacas imported into the UK and we are the leading alpaca industry in Europe with around 45,000 alpacas. Mainland Europe has approximately 25,000 alpacas in total, which is a long way from the Australian herd of over 400,000!

Alpaca breeding if done right is not only profitable but wonderfully fulfilling, and the amount of interest is growing year on year. We started breeding alpacas just 8 years ago and at that time virtually no one we spoke to had even heard of alpacas, let alone thought of owning them. But things have changed, especially over the last 5 years, and we are seeing more and more people either looking to diversify into breeding alpacas or owning alpaca products. Kate Middleton even wore alpaca on her recent visit to Canada.

Everyone agrees this is just the start with large growth forecast in the next 20 years, and it’s not just the UK. Though several years behind us, the rest of Europe has definitely caught the alpaca bug! We believe with such growing interest and burgeoning markets on our doorstep there has never been a better time to seriously look to diversify into alpacas. 

Currently here in the UK we produce only 2% of worldwide wool totals, around 21,000 tonnes, but it tends to be low value high 30+ micron sheep wool. Though there will always be a market for this high micron sheep wool the real demand and growth is in finer, softer low micron fibre such as alpaca due to higher standards of living worldwide and a requirement for more luxurious, softer garments. Alpacas have all the attributes to supply this fast growing market, without any of the inherent animal welfare or environmental issues of imported fine fibre from the likes of angora and cashmere.