Welcome GreenPaca Gauge and The Gentleman ('Gent')... These two little guys were born a day apart, and have become best buddies over the last few weeks. Gent (the fawn) was born first, and for his mother Princesa, labor and delivery was not a pleasant experience. Being a maiden, Gent is her first cria, and anyone observing her going through labor would have thought she was dying. I even had some worries for a while because she was being so dramatic. Between the moaning, the grunting, laying around sprawled out in awkward positions, and refusing to eat, she was fit to be tied with whatever was going on inside her belly. And this went on for almost 2 days. *sigh*
When the delivery process finally began, it was obvious that this wasn't going to be your ordinary, easy alpaca birth. First, the cria was stuck at the nose and one foot for what seemed like forever. With a little help, he was out to his hips, and there he hung for, again, forever. With back legs and his hips still tangled up in mom, we put a call into the vet for some assistance with a 'stuck' cria. Well, don't you know as soon as you put a call into the vet, the situation takes care of itself?!?!? Sure enough, baby finally works himself free, and out he comes. Wonderful! Baby is here!
Well..... apparently we weren't in the clear yet. With all of the stress of a difficult birth, baby is breathing hard through the mouth, instead of the normal, healthy nasal breathing. And now I'm worrying about defects in his breathing passages, obstructions, you name it. After a lot of suctioning and watching him like a hawk for the next 20 minutes, his breathing started to normalize and, as a result, mine did too. Wonderful! Baby is breathing!
Well..... apparently we weren't in the clear yet. Being a new mom, I'm sure Princesa was thinking, 'Thank goodness that evil thing is out of me!' She was laying down, chewing her cud 10 feet from Gent, not even looking in his direction. No checking him out, no smelling of tail or top knot, nothing. *Sigh* Hasn't this been difficult enough already?!?!? Now we've got to get mama to accept baby. After some nudging and coaxing, we had Princesa up and moving in Gent's direction. A sniff of the top knot. Okay... She looks around. Chewing her cud, she just stands there, not really seeming to care. Wait... a sniff of the body, and then the tail. Okay good! It's a start! More cud chewing... more sniffing... and then.... she lays down right next to him! *sigh of relief* Wonderful! Mama and baby are bonding!
Well..... apparently we weren't out of the clear yet. After a little while of cushing together after this eventful birth, Gent starts to try and get his legs under him like every new cria does within an hour or so of birth. He's having some trouble figuring out this whole new thing called 'balance,' and is wobbling and falling left and right. He does the cria wheelbarrow walk, gets tangled up in his own legs, all of the typical fumbling that babies do when learning to walk at an hour old. When he finally starts to figure it out, I notice that he seems to be favoring one of his back legs a little. The more steady he gets on his feet, the more apparent the limp is, and I do a quick examination to make sure that there is nothing stuck in his foot and that both legs feel the same. In my highly untrained opinion, everything looked and felt fine. But there was no escaping the fact that there was a limp that seemed to be originating at the hip. *sigh* Is the hip out of place? Is something wrong with his leg? My alpaca mentor and I discuss the difficult birth, how he was stuck at the hip, and his awkward position during birth. We decide to observe the leg and his gait closely the next 24 hours and see if there is any improvement.
Twenty-four hours go by. There is a slight improvement. I give it another 24. Slight improvement. Another 24. Getting better and stronger... Well, after a total of 6 closely scrutinized days and a little help from some JumpStart paste, Gent was running, jumping, and playing like normal with all of his little alpaca buddies. Especially with little Gauge, who was born in the midst of Gent's dramatic and nail-biting recovery from birth. Wonderful! Two healthy crias!
Now a month old, Gent is a happy and healthy little bugger, and Princesa looks like an old pro at this mothering bit. He earned his name, 'The Gentleman,' because he was calm and sweet, strong and commanding from day 1. His fleece is GORGEOUS, and we sincerely hope he lives up to his lineage. Gent will be in the show ring in the spring, and hopefully turning the heads of all the ladies... :) What girl doesn't want a true gentleman???
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