The Hollyhock Blog

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas.  2009 is just around the corner.  Let’s hope next year brings a better economy and more peaceful and safe world.  For my part, I’m hoping to help folks stay warm with lots of alpaca mittens, scarves, hats, blankets and socks!

WARNING:  This story is kinda gross.  If your stomach turns at the idea of nasty baby diapers or toddler vomit, you may want to skip this part.   A few days ago, I was doing my noon-time chores of cleaning the alpaca pens, filling hay and water, etc.  As I was scooping up the poo pile, Georgie came over to supervise and check out my work.   I generally start a conversation with her, but still keep my eyes on my job.   After she sneezed a couple times, I looked at her face to see if there was something wrong.  I saw something under her nose – I assumed it was just mucus - an alpaca booger of sorts.  I got closer to see she has matter in her eyes – perhaps she had a little cold.  Then I noticed what looked like blood around the edge of her mouth.  I touched the unidentified thing on her nose and it didn’t move.   It was solid, almost a brassy color.   My first thought was that it was a staple like what is used in super heavy cardboard boxes.   It wasn’t.  But once I was holding Georgie still, I pulled it out.  It was a piece of hay – about 7 inches long, nearly half was up one nostril, about a half inch was pressed against her nose and upper mouth and the remaining 3+ inches were heading down her throat.   I have never seen any like that before.   The hay stem must have broken a membrane in her nose that caused the bleeding into her mouth.  I checked her mouth as best I could – she was not real keen on me sticking my fingers in her mouth at this point – and could find no source of blood there.  I finished up my chores, then checked her out again and her teeth were shiny white and there was no sign of continued bleeding or any breathing problems.  It was a very scary few minutes for me!  

I finished a pair of felted wrist warmers for Darryl for Christmas.  He tried them out immediately.   I’ve also started knitting several things to begin to build up my 2009 inventory.   As I get them finished, I’ll get some pictures.

And a happy ending – I have received Georgie’s registration paper.  She’s officially official!

A couple days ago I gave one of new my cat toys to my friend Karen’s cat Spooky.  Spooky had a rough 2008 – health problems that continue to require vet visits.   I wanted to make 2009 a little more fun for her.  Karen sent me this shot of Spooky with her new toy.

Spooky playing

I make these little toys of felted alpaca fiber, filled with catnip.  $5 each.  Some even have little jingle bells inside.  I’ve had 3 cats test them and they agreed the toys are great fun.   In January my Mom and I will be teaching felting classes to 4-H’ers in Pine County – where I was a 10-year 4-H’er -   we’ll teach felting soap bars and cat toys.   More on that as the details emerge!

I’ve sent my indigo outside!  If you remember, we dug up 2 big indigo plants in the fall, potted them and they have been living in my house since.  My goal was to get enough seeds for 2009′s dyeing projects.  I quit watering them a few days ago.

Indigo plant

Today I stripped off the drying flowers & seeds and set the pots on the front step.   My timing was perfect as Darryl was just shoveling the snow off the step and dumped the dirt and plants in the garden.  I’ll just let the flowers dry a while longer, then try to get the seeds from the chaff.  The bowl by the plant is nearly full after stripping the second plant.   I don’t think the new flowers – those that bloomed since coming indoors will have seeds – only the flowers that were pollinated while in the garden.   The seeds are very tiny.

Indigo seeds

And I have found it difficult to separate them from the chaff.  I’ve been collecting these since fall.  I don’t need a lot of plants, but I’m not sure yet if my seeds will germinate.  Spring will tell that tale!

I got a ‘good news’ email the other day.  It was from ARI- the Alpaca Registry.   Georgie’s registration has been completed – she is now officially the offspring of Toro and Spotsie.  I have access to the DNA markers for all alpacas that I own via the members-only are of the ARI website.   So I made a little chart of Georgie’s markers – they tested for 14 markers for her.  (I was wrong in my previous post – it is 14 not 12.)   Then I looked at Toro’s, who now also has 14 markers listed due to the second run of his DNA tests.   And then I checked Spotsie’s.   Here is what I found:  The numbers below are Georgie’s.  If in blue, they match Toro’s.   If in red, they match Spotsie exactly.  If in violet, Spotsie’s number at that marker is 1 different than Georgie’s.  If in pink, Spotsie and Georgie’s marker differ by 2.

  86      106        

134            156         

188            202         

228            258

237            255

313            313

268            286

126            128

127            131

286            296

134            152

213            227

152            174

188      188

 If you add up the blue numbers, there are 13 that match between Georgie and Toro.  And we just squeaked by with 8 that match or are close enough between Georgie and Spotsie.   I certainly can’t claim to understand even the slightest bit of what really happens with the DNA tests and markers and all that.  I’m just happy to know that I don’t have to pay to have Spotsie’s tests re-run – at least not this time!  And once I physically have Georgie’s registration paper in my hand, I’ll really feel like the process is all done! 

Did anyone else partake of that craft in the 70′s where you cut out plastic shapes, colored them and baked them to make them shrink?  Maybe I had a bit too much fun back then.  Or maybe I didn’t have enough fun.  Because I’m still having fun shrinking stuff!

Once again, here is the before of the fingerless gloves.

Before -- again

Fingerless gloves - felted

 

Mittens - before felting

And

Mittens - after felting

Are decorations needed?

Every year I say our tree is beautiful without decorations.  Maybe this is the year it stays just like this. 

As I am writing this, Darryl is outside plowing several inches of new snow.   In order to plow the paddock area for the alpacas, the gates need to be opened so he can push the snow out onto the pasture.  The girls got to romp through the snow piles.

Playing in the snow

More fun in the snow

I got a lesson in DNA the other day.  Remember that I got Carley’s registration paper, but not Geogie’s?  I had been watching the ARI website and progress seemed to stall.  The lab work was marked as completed, but the parental match was not checked for either the dam (Spotsie) or sire (Toro).  My assumption was that there was a glitch in the software, so I emailed ARI to see if there was a problem.   And that is when I got my lesson.   Genetics and DNA is way complicated – even after my brief education I don’t think I really understand what I know.   I’ll try to explain the problem with Georgie as I sort of understand it.

Until very recently, the DNA lab tried to find 10 markers (markers are little bits of DNA) on each alpaca from the blood sample sent in.  For some reason, one of those is no longer used, leaving 9 markers identified on most alpacas.  But sometimes not all 9 were found.  This was the case for Toro, who has only 7.  They now look for 12 markers.  So 8 of Georgie’s markers need to match 8 of each parent’s.  Obviously, that couldn’t be possible for Toro.  Fortunately, they still have Toro’s sample on hand, so they are going to test that again.   Hopefully, they’ll find up to 12 markers – 8 of which will match with Georgie. 

As for Spotsie, she has 9 markers, but Georgie only matched 7.   Markers are 3-digit numbers, like 122.  The offspring has to be within a range of the parent’s marker – such as between 120 and 124 for my example.  Apparently the problem is a couple of Georgie’s markers were out of the range required – perhaps 125.   On the second run to verify Toro’s parentage, it is possible that Georgie’s marker that was 125 on the first run could be 123 on the second run.   This would be sufficient to declare Spotsie as Georgie’s mother.  

Clear as mud?  I’ve been trying to wrap my brain around this just enough to create this post and that has taken me several days, many hours of scratching my head and much use of the backspace key on my keyboard!  So cross your fingers that this works.