BREEDING WILL OUT

To my friends and colleagues, breeders of the noble alpaca: In Peru, the country of my birth, the heavens scattered alpacas like hail on a beautiful summer afternoon on the frigid summits of the southern Andes. Since the beginning of time quality lineage has always revealed its presence. I believe selection will always identify superior quality. Nowadays, your breeding stock, in North America, is of optimal quality, properly registered and carrying on with the South American lineage. This is the best guarantee for any breeder. In the raising of young alpacas, the decisions you make today will have a deep impact on the future.

The alpacas of North America have a constructive potential. If you look to the alpaca herds and their many characteristics, you will soon see an average. When I visited your ranches and farms and inspected the characteristics of your alpacas, I was astonished by the genetics that are available. I want to compliment my American friends who, in a few years, have found the art of walking behind the alpaca.

With all the advantages that you have in the USA, I think that you are on the eve of creating one or several very special types of alpaca that take their own excellent characters from the new methodology applied in their breeding. In such a way, and based on my observations of some breeders, North America may produce the finest wool of the alpaca, in the world.

The alpaca industry is diversified and there is a continuous renovation that benefits its textile production. What grade of refinement will be possible when applying rigorous methods of selection? All systems of breeding have been blowing the winds of change in the direction of the textile market. What is left to the breeder is a dilemma of quality and amount.

Refinement and density in the huacaya; brightness, refinement and density in the suri. Everything is one with perfect lineage. It requires creators who endeavor to turn the alpaca into the most beautiful animal, always more productive. This metamorphosis of genes must be into the hands of able people and not those who refuse to exchange their heavy boots for slippers so that they may be able to walk faster behind the alpaca.

Don Julio Barreda
Estancia Accoyo
Macusani, Peru