By Mike Safley
The 2005 Alpaca Show season started off with a bang, not your typical pyrotechnic bang, but the type that comes with change and the disruption of business as usual. The fuse was a series of new show rules that address the issue of grooming alpacas. Grooming is out and natural paddock condition is in: The fat is in the fire.
The grooming of alpacas in the United States dates back to the very first alpaca show in Grass Valley, California. The rules against grooming are rather recent and have generally occurred in reaction to the practice of show fitting that has become a high art among some exhibitors. This persistent practice of preparing show alpacas brought us to the point where something needed to be done.
To illustrate this need, I will tell you about a rather ugly incident that began at the Kentucky Classic in Louisville, Kentucky and continued on to the North American Alpaca Show in Springfield, Massachusetts—but not yet. The new anti-grooming rules that have caused all of the consternation are no small matter—we are talking about playing by the rules versus cheating. Should we groom our alpacas like show poodles or present them as production quality livestock where our focus is superior selection and genetic gain? Read more
Related links:
Cheating at Shows by Jude Anderson
Showing Suri Alpacas by Maggie Krieger
Hair Shine: An Analytically Elusive Phenomenon? by F.-J. Wortmann, E. Schulze, B. Bourceau