Happy Birthday, Hank!

We occasionally pause in our lives as Soay shepherds to celebrate notable anniversaries or milestones, this time the eighth birthday of our guardian llama Hank, and to recall how dumb, and dumbfounded, we were when he arrived on our farm. Let me explain.

Shortly after we began our heritage sheep adventure, we fell heir to a rescue flock of American Soay sheep and their guardian llama, Llucy. We were delighted to have an animal reputed to be expert in disemboweling with one swift kick any coyote who sauntered by with lamb chops on its mind. A couple of years later we decided to breed Llucy, in part because the male offered up by friends was known as “El Niño” was deemed worthy of Lucy’s affections. Mind you, we knew almost nothing about llamas, only the accidental knowledge that followed inevitably from having Llucy arrive on our doorstep with her flock of rescue sheep.

Ignorance had not deterred us from acquiring Soay sheep and that foolishness had turned out quite well, so we shrugged our shoulders and figured we would again learn on the fly. The 350-day gestation period (ouch!) came and went, with no sign Llucy was pregnant. Days later, when we had given up on Llucy, Steve’s visiting brother ran up to the house to warn us that Llucy had been injured, she was bleeding. Not a bit of it. To our amazement, in short order a slimy black head appeared, then even slimier gangly legs, and we had ourselves a healthy little llama.

Our no-name baby llama wasted little time getting up on its legs to figure out where the tantalizing odor of mother’s milk was coming from. He was a a slimy little thing that looked ever so much like a miniature Creature From The Black Lagoon. If you have never seen a baby llama, all you need to know is that they consist of long legs, an even longer neck, and a mouth, the only body parts they need in order to be able to eat for the first few weeks. One of our Soay colleagues calls her baby llamas “noodle necks.” Another refers to them as garden hoses slathered with vaseline. Attractive thought, isn’t it? Aren’t you glad you started reading this post?

Let me introduce the people in the next pictures. Jerry and Nancy McGrew, the brokers for El Niño, are also close friends and they closely followed Lucy’s gestation, with strict instructions to call them as soon as it looked like Llucy would … um … lamb? (I know that’s not the word, but I sure don’t know what the llama equivalent is, even now). They, like we, had given up on Llucy, so we had to track them down with the breathless report of a cria on the ground. Here they are with Steve’s visiting brother Jim and partner Jillian, enjoying the new little guy and providing a celebratory glass of wine. Who needs a fancy wine bar in town when you have a perfectly good Maternity Ward in which to raise a toast?

Despite his late arrival, Hank quickly gained a following, and his name. Our friend Pat Gladden from Chicago could not stop talking about how much her new grandson, Hank, would love the baby llama, so he became “Hank” as well. One of our favorite customer’s three girls took a minute to nuzzle with Hank while their parents loaded up their new Soay sheep. My big-city brother Jim (to date the only guest author on this blog, by the way) and wife Kat and daughter Julie thought Hank was just fine as long as we promised not to send him home with them. And Shawn immediately became Hank’s best human friend and the only one of us who managed to hand-shear Hank a year ago. I love the silky mottled look of Hank’s “cut.”

I had to laugh as I was looking up the photos for this birthday post, remembering how bamboozled Steve and I were at having a baby llama. Here are my favorite photos of the delighted, clueless new llama “uncle.” (if the keeper of sheep is a shepherd, is the keeper of a llama a llamherd?)

In the livestock world, the time of all cute little fuzzy things must come to an end as they grow to their appointed size and shape appropriate to the task. And so it was with Hank.

He grew and grew, and then grew some more. Today he is an imposing figure in the pastures, never hesitating to run full tilt up the hill to the road when perceived threats in Spandex come running by the farm. If you were a coyote, would you take a chance on crossing paths with this guy? Happy birthday, Hank!

For now …

Tags: guardian llama, Soay sheep