ALPACA HISTORY COMPOSITE
Bones and skeletons of the camelid’s early ancestors have been found in archeological sites in Nebraska, USA dating three million years ago. The researchers have found that these animals traveled south into modern day Mexico, Central America, and possibly as far as, South America due to an Ice Age.
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A few hundred years later they moved back northward along the Pacific ocean with some migrating across the land bridge of the modern day Aleutian Islands. The animals that did not cross the land bridge eventually traveled south. Those ending in South America were believed to be the foundation for today’s wild species of the vicuña and guanaco.
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| Vicuna have some of the finest fiber, yet today. They are wild and not pets. |
Nearly 7000 year ago the natives of South America started domesticating the wild animals of their continent. It is believed that the vicuna may have been domesticated into the alpaca due to evidence supported through the similar dental characteristics. The larger cousin, the llama, is believed to have been domesticated from the guanaco. Since modern scholars have not found or deciphered any written language, how they domesticated these animals is not yet known and remains theory.
One researcher described the social pattern of guanacos as “loosely formed groups of males and females that join to breed”. In other words, the guanaco herd loosely separated, as llamas do. The opposite was seen to be true in the vicuna. The vicuña male has a “harem” of five to seven females that stay together for a lifetime, moving from summer pastures to winter feeding grounds, with all offspring driven away at weaning time. This may explain the behavior difference we see between today’s llamas and alpacas.
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| Guanaco |
The Inca has frequently been credited with perfecting these wonderful animals, but many people living before the Inca had finely woven cloth of super fine alpaca fiber, as proven by the dating of the tombs they left. Anthropologists have also found alpaca and llama in tombs outside the extreme altitudes of the Alti Plano where most of the live animals are now located.
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| Alto Plano - now populated greatly, but look at those hills! |
The Spanish Conquest of the 1600’s drove most of the camelids into the very high altitude where survival was questionable. The conquistadors took the small amounts of arid land for their sheep, horses, cattle and other livestock. The camelid populations seemed to vanish.
In the 1800s shippers of wool from the sheep of South America started using llama & alpaca fiber as ballast to fill the holds of their ships. When the ships arrived in England the fiber was discarded until Sir Titus Salt became curious about this very soft, fine material. He secured some of the fiber and found it to have exceptional strength for its diameter. There was also a wider range of colors than was found in sheep’s wool. It felt softer because it has less scaly than the sheep wool, not to mention it was lighter in weight due to being partially hollow. To top it all off, alpaca had no greasy feel (due to no lanolin) like the sheep wool and was therefore, naturally much cleaner.
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| Sir Titus Salt |
Sir Titus made adjustments to the machinery (combs, cards, spinners and etc.) to handle this finer fiber and soon had some wonderful cloth. His mill ran for a number of years, allowing a few people to own and admire the clothing made from alpaca. Other mills refused to make changes to handle the new fiber, and when the shippers found there was a market for this “throw away fiber” the prices rose and Sir Titus could not generate enough interest to keep the very expensive alpaca clothing popular. This wonderful fiber and the animal that brought it fell out of the spotlight due to cost.
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| The Saltaire Mill and home of Sir Titus |
During the 1st World War, alpaca were rediscovered. An unknown person created under-suits of alpaca to be worn by aviators beneath their leather garments. These airmen blessed the warmth of alpaca and led it to popularity throughout Europe. Many English and French servicemen sought out supplies of alpaca garments and readily purchased them. Even US servicemen brought home alpaca clothing for themselves or for loved ones.
During this time the US clothing mills were still reluctant to make the changes necessary to produce alpaca yard goods. Sheep’s wool was plentiful, cheap, and the public was accustomed to it. The popularity of alpaca was not yet embraced.
In the late 1970’s and early 1980’s the US citizens were becoming more aware of environmental and health issues and there followed a “back to earth” movement. Many folks wanted to create their own clothing by spinning or roving, weaving or knitting, and shaping or designing “their” way. Natural fiber clothing was in demand and the door was finally open for the US to discover alpaca.
A group of enterprising importers took a "leap of faith" in 1983 and imported from Chile about 200 huacaya alpacas. At that time, maybe one person in 1000 knew what an alpaca was and the importers worked hard selling these animals.
The IRS was making it difficult for investors to shelter income from taxes and because alpacas are livestock, farmers could gain some tax advantages by owing and breeding them. Additional imports added to the genetic base, but all the alpacas were coming from Chile. Then in 1993 Peru finally allowed exportation thus importing 200-500 per year (both huacaya and suri). There were five subsequent Peruvian imports in succeeding years and an additional 1998 Canadian import, which was sold in 1999.
The imported alpacas came from a wide number of farms in Peru. In 1994 the farm-of-origin records were added to the information given to the purchasers. Beginning in 1995 the importers provided purchasers with fleece reports (histograms). The actual number screened for import in 1995 was 1,980 but 86 were rejected for not meeting the minimum standards set by ARI and its membership. In 1996 the first Bolivian huacaya alpacas reached the US. During this year importers screened 732 with about 226 (31%) rejected due to more stringent standards set that year.
Alpaca ownership was and still is becoming very desirable to many folks. It allows a family to become farmers on relatively small acreages, while creating a second income for them. Children can learn to appreciate the environment away from the problems of the big city life and also learn the responsibility of caring for another living creature.
Because of this popularity, a number of people tried to jump into the importation business and in early 1995, the imports expected (*1,900) were nearly 40% of the total Alpaca population (4,000) in North America. This expected saturation was more than the few hundred breeders could absorb and after meetings and discussions, the breeders voted to close the Registry to all imports as of December 31, 1998. The breeders have the option to re-open the imports in the future if it is found that the US needs to introduce new genetic material.
The first owners of alpacas were very wise in establishing a “blood registry”. The registry has become The Alpaca Registry Incorporated (ARI). It not only keeps track of all alpacas, but it is also responsible for creating and enforcing importation standards to keep the North American herd as good as it can be. In 1999, the Registry started using DNA matching.
About 99% of all alpacas in the US are registered.
ALPACA REGISTERED AS OF NOVEMBER 2008 = 142,744 and growing!
It is warranted to input some up to date statistical information in here at this time. There are now an estimated 637,888 in the United States alone producing in excess of 2,551,552 pounds of fiber each year (Retrieved on March 17, 2011 from https://www.alpacaowners.com/index.asp. Alpaca Owners and Breeders Association, Nashville, TN) !
The love for alpaca has been here for a very long time. It is not new, it is steady and increasing on an average of 300% per year!
