This past weekend we attended an Educational Seminar by Wade Gease at Triple Diamonds Alpacas Ranch. Wade Gease is an AOBA Certified Judge and Judge Trainer. We attended a seminar put on by him a few years back, but we know in those years we've had new experiences and new questions pop up. This gave us a chance to listen, learn, and ask those questions.
The morning was spent looking over an alpaca from head to toe, assessing each part of them from their top know to teeth to fiber, tail and toes. The afternoon was a mock show ring where people took turns practice showing.
Unfortunately by afternoon I had quite a bad migraine, so I did not take advantage of fine tuning my showing skills. J got up there and had a turn at it, but he's done so much showing in the ring he didn't need it as much as I could have. I decided my biggest anxiety about showing is that I get mixed up between left and right, so which hand to hold the leash in and which way to turn the alpaca gets confusing to me. I have been in the ring and had the alpaca turned the wrong way. It all worked out in the end (my animal still got 1st place), but it would have saved me some anxiety not to have that happen.
We have found that in the alpaca industry, there is always something new to learn. This is what keeps J and I so interested in alpacas. New things come up, new experiences present themselves, and there are changes within the alpaca industry. More so than actually learning from the seminar, is getting together with fellow alpaca owners and learning from each other. I love to hear how other farms cria are doing. I love to learn what other farms do with their fiber. If we all learn and grow together, it will make the alpaca industry that much stronger.
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