Llama Biography # 19: Autumn Hill's Trillium

This is another semi-sad biography, but not until the very end...

The next llama to join our herd was Autumn Hill's Trillium.

Autumn Hill's Trillium at about a month old.

Once we got Randallama's Cherokee to be our main herdsire, we quickly let him get to work breeding our females.  Little May Flowers was one of those females, and she was bred to Cherokee in the fall of 2004.

Randallama's Cherokee, Trillium's sire.

Little May Flowers, Trillium's dam.  May was pregnant with Trillium in this picture.

In September 2005, I came home from school one afternoon to find May looking very uncomfortable.  It soon became clear that May definitely was in labor, so I grabbed the neonatal book and birthing kit and camped out in the barn for awhile.  A little while later May delivered a gorgeous true black female cria.  With May's first baby, it took her awhile to figure out that she was responsible for it, so we were careful not to intervene too much with her second baby.  Luckily May was a great mom!

May and Trillium...twins!

I love true black llamas, so this little girl quickly became a favorite.  She also had amazing presence and the most gorgeous fiber.  

Goofy baby!

A very dusty Trillium at 3 months old.  Her half-brother (same sire) Inali is behind her.

Trillium at 4 months old.

Trillium went to her first show in the spring of 2006, the Western Ohio Triple Crown.  Even with not behaving well, she placed 6th in a huge class of Medium Wool Juvenile females.  Friends of ours saw her at the show, and decided that she needed to join their farm.  I was sad to see her go, but was glad she was going to a great home.

Trillium at 7 months old.

Several months after Trillium left the farm, I found out that she had contracted a parasite and died.  It was a huge loss, for both myself and the other farm.  Her legacy does live on though...May was rebred to Cherokee a few years later and had another stunning cria!

May with Trillium's full brother.  He is now a breeding male in Kentucky.

Llama Biography #18: Randallama's Cherokee

Well I made my first chronological mistake...I forgot Cherokee!

Cherokee.

Randallama's Cherokee was purchased from Mark Smith Farms in the summer of 2004.  Our then young herdsire, Navarro, hadn't been able to settle a female, so we needed another male.  Cherokee had been purchased by Mark Smith Farms several years before and used as a breeding male until they acquired the famous Tuna Catcher.  We were happy to add him to our farm!

Cherokee was 3rd at the ALSA Nationals.

Cherokee was a great breeding male for our farm.  He was easy to handle but an aggressive breeder.

Cherokee had great presence and bone.

Cherokee and Navarro never did get along...they fought quite aggressively at first, and anytime one of them got "lucky" after that.  It was always a bit scary to watch them fight...

Cherokee got to work pretty quick after we bought him.  We bred him with 3 females in the fall of 2004, and the crias were born in 2005.  Trillium (May's daughter), Catastrophie (Cattera's daughter), and Inali (April's son) were all quite impressive.

Cherokee's crias, Trillium, Catastrophie, Inali (L to R).

We bred Cherokee to Cattera again in 2006, and Catallegre was born in 2007.  We also bred May to him in 2006, but she was sold before the cria was born.  Surprisingly the baby looked exactly like Catallegre!

Catallegre.

May and her cria, Picasso.

We decided to keep Catastrophie as a breeding female, so Cherokee went to a new home in the spring of 2007.  He's still breeding on a farm down south.

Llama Biography #6: Little May Flowers

I'm terrible at remembering to take pictures when I'm out doing things with the llamas, but I'm really going to try harder!  Until I have some cool new pictures to talk about, I'll share another of our wonderful llamas with you.

Little May Flowers, Spring 2005.

The sixth llama to join our herd was Little May Flowers, aka May.  She was the first cria born on our farm.  April (Alder Crest April Showers) gave birth to May on May 9th, 2000.  We came home after school that night and found May laying in the poop pile!  She started off looking a little rough, but she quickly grew into a gorgeous little girl.  She had the most gorgeous fiber too!

Little May Flowers, Summer 2000.

May's dam, Alder Crest April Showers.

May's sire, Taj's California Sun.

May wearing a bandana, Summer 2000.

May's gorgeous locked fiber, Spring 2005.

May was also the first cria that I got to train from the very beginning.  Luckily I had learned a lot about training with Sheba, so May got off to a good start.  Once May was a year old, I showed her in 4-H and open shows.  We did pretty well together, especially the second year.

May's first show, Spring 2001.  We won Showmanship!

May's first show, wearing her gypsy costume.  We won the class too!

May and I at the 2002 Indy Open show.  We won Showmanship and placed well in performance.

Another costume...May was such a good sport!  Summer 2002.

May and I after winning Showmanship at the 2002 Indiana State Fair!

May and I at the 2002 Great Lakes Regional.  We were 2nd in Showmanship!

Once May was 2.5 yrs old, we decided to retire her from showing and let her be a mom.  We bred her to a beautiful white male (SHAG Guido), and 11 months later she gave us a little boy, Autumn Hill's Blazing Starr.  May wasn't real sure about being a mom for a few days and we had to bottle feed Blaze, but she caught on eventually.  Blaze went on to grow into one of the nicest crias we've ever had.  His little sister gave him a run for his money though!  Autumn Hill's Trillium, sired by our (then) new herdsire Randallama's Cherokee, was a fabulous little girl.  We bred May one more time, this time to our younger herdsire, AAL Navarro.  We were a little disappointed with the resulting cria, Autumn Hill's Camissia, but she grew up quite nice.  Shortly after Camissia was born, we sold May and Camissia to be alpaca guards.  May was bred back to Cherokee, and had another gorgeous little boy.  I'm still sad that I sold her!

May's first cria, Autumn Hill's Blazing Starr.  Winter 2003.

May's second cria, Autumn Hill's Trillium.  Fall 2005.

May and Trillium.  Talk about a carbon copy!

May's third cria, Autumn Hill's Camissia.

May and her final cria.