Meet the Herd: Tiberious (a.k.a Tibbs)

Patou Tiberious, to give him his full name, came to live with us in 2019. It was a bit of an accident actually, well, at least unintended.

We went to the Somerset County show one glorious late September day in 2019. My plan was to sit in front of the alpaca halter show all day, to see if I could get my eye in, reinforce what I thought of as a good alpaca by trying to guess which would win each class.

As the day went on I got better and better at guessing, although I couldn’t feel the fleece for softness as the judges could.

Toward the end of the day the black males were judged, and my eye was immediately taken by one (Tibbs) which I was sure would win. He didn’t, beaten into second by a more mature male, but I felt he was robbed!

I spoke to the owner who explained that the winning male was from one of the very top breeders in the UK; very well funded and frequent winners. I also

 saw that the winning male was named Champion on the day too; so no shame in coming second to him.

We went home, tired and happy, with thoughts of trying to breed a similar male to Tibbs.

A week or so later I saw a Facebook post advertising a black male for sale, and my suspicions were confirmed when I contacted the owner; it was Tibbs!

Long story short, I bought him.

When we discussed delivery, his owner/breeder, Mark Steele, asked if he could take him to the Welsh National show, as he was entered. I agreed and am most proud to say that Tibbs won in his class.

Tibbs is currently expecting his first brood of seven cria this year. I’m so excited to see if he passes his colour and fiber characteristic on to his cria…..watch this space….. the first is expected in early May this year.