We have a reader’s photo entry! Perhaps this will prod some of you into sending your own contributions (2 photos max, though it’s actually 3), showing what you’re up to.
The Reader of the Day is Jeffrey Hatley, whose captions are indented.
As a long-time reader, I’m dutifully answering your call for photos from readers. I’m a mathematician at Union College in Schenectady, NY, and my partner and I live near the Adirondacks on our little farm, where we enjoy the company of our three cats, our flock of chickens, and our five llamas! I’ve attached some pictures of the animals. Here are some of the thing you’ll find:
A nice shot of me and Nicole with our two oldest llamas, Nimbus and Maverick, posing in the snow.
One of our chickens, Darcy, sitting on my leg and hollering while I try to read.
Here are our five llamas, lounging around and playing King of the Hill earlier this summer.
All five our of llamas have the same sire, making them all at least half-brothers. Our two oldest llamas, Nimbus and Maverick [above], are in fact full brothers. They are about one year apart in age.
Despite their reputation for spitting, llamas truly hate to spit, since it tastes bad to them and ruins their appetite (and they are normally voracious eaters!). Llamas will only spit at each other in order to assert dominance and establish a pecking order, and they’ll only spit at a human if they feel threatened. In fact, llamas are extremely gentle and agreeable animals, and ours are particularly friendly. We even take them to childrens’ birthday parties!
Thanks for disabusing us our misconceptions regarding llamas and expectoration!
You’re welcome…and please spread the word! There’s a lot of disinformation out there these days, and some of it is about llamas.
Llovely llamas🥰
Thanks so much! We think so too =]
Very nice pictures, pleasant feelings. the mouthy one must be a rooster?
She’s actually a hen — and she’s a great egg-layer to boot! =]
Cool pics. Thanx.
How interesting! That is quite a menagerie you have there.
I love llamas and alpacas. I once had a next door neighbor who raised both. I can attest to your description of llamas (and alpacas) as being friendly, gentle and they’re also very curious. They sometimes got loose and came into our yard. My wife and I would greet them and walk them back over. They were very easy to “handle”.
Didn’t Darcy hurt your bare leg with her thorny feet?
Enjoyed all the photos, thanks for sharing.
They really are wonderful animals! We never had any intention of owning livestock, but we went to a local farm that let us go hiking with llamas, and after that we were hooked!
Yes, her feet do scratch a bit, but our cats’ claws are even sharper, so I guess I’m used to it, haha.
Lovely Llamas. Llamas are much in the news these days. Apparently they have special and effective antibodies, called nano-bodies because of their small size. Researchers are trying to use Llama anti-bodies to treat serious covid cases in humans. How, I am clueless.
Look out, there are llamas!
Alpaca my bags…!
Boooo😂
I know, terrible. Two of my kids (now aged 17 & 16) are known as the alpacas after a children’s BBC show they used to watch about two alpacas called Nuzzle and Scratch who worked for an employment agency and always messed things up (Theme song’ “We’re alpacas from the Andes/ With hooves instead of handies”). https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=vsEBtSSk3H0
Cute😻
If I had a huge property, that’s what I’d want – llamas! Thanks for the lovely family album pics, Jeffrey. I love the faminals (family animals).
Splendid beasts they are. I have friends will alpacas. A close cousin I assume.
What a picturesque life! Thank you for sharing.
What a beautiful place you live in. I used to go to camp in the Adirondacks many decades ago.
I love the llamas! I saw a llama farm on the internet on Martha’s Vineyard. They do llama yoga. You can also have a message delivered by llama to the Martha’s Vineyard area. I wanted to send something by llama to a friend but they were social distancing the llamas due to the pandemic.
We had llama’s by accident for about a year. The female was secretly pregnant, so we got a male, but learned that males can be dangerous if not raised correctly.
I don’t want to hurt feelings, but they’re also not too bright. As in, the lights are on but nobody’s home.
Great for packing though. They can go anywhere.
Lucky guy.
Your llamas are fantastic. (We are not allowed to keep them in my apartment building- though I do have a dog I dress up as a llama on public holidays)
You don’t have to live in Manhattan at the moment.
Your partner looks hot.
You own a chicken.
My hat off to you, sir!
D.A., NYC