Cross Country Skiing with Bella and Winny

Driving!

Hana and I took Bella and Winny to "the meadows" which are a series of hay fields on the edge of town that follow the Ammanoosuc River. Bella carried Hana's skis for her on the way down. What a good llama!Bella was unsure of the deep snow but Winny jumped right in!Ah, we're there!

Winny looks at our yellow lab, Sam. Sam wants to go skiing too, she's jealous that Hana is playing with Bella and not her!

Ready for the skis?After a couple tries and learning where Bella wanted to go - away they went! We learned that it helped if Winny led for Bella to follow. Bella is very good at the command "whoa" which is one of the main reasons she is so good to ski with. When Hana falls, Bella has to know to stop quickly!
Kerplop!
Bit the snow!

Here, Winny is taking notes while Hana is training Bella! I recently took my exam for a course called the History and Application of Draft Animals. Part of my final exam was to drive Green Mountain College's two oxen, Bill and Lou. VPR interviewed us and you can listen to that program here. After listening to Kenneth's explanation of "gee" and "haw" it helped Hana to remember which side is which. Now Bella and Hana are a little better at general steering and directions! We both encourage you to listen to it!

Again, Winny is leading so Bella sort of knows where to go. Bella is very calm around cars, so we were able to keep going on the snowy parts of the street/sidewalk back home.Wee!

Bella loves pulling! She goes right up the hill with Hana - no problem! One of the most important things in a driving llama is one that enjoys moving forward. In the beginning Bella did not really understand being asked to "walk on" from behind when she was used to Hana at her side. If you want a driving llama it is good to start young so you do not need to re-train their leading knowledge.

Behind Hana and Bella are the old train station and Opera Block of Woodsville. This town was built on the railroad systems that connected us to other parts of New Hampshire. Only the old railroad bed remain today - but they make excellent cross country skiing paths!

Peacable Kingdom...Continued!

Our yellow lab, Sam, is a little wary of the llamas. The llamas love to see her though!Here is Ollie again! He's looking for his escape route...

Ollie enjoys sitting in the llama pen in their hay - right next to the bird feeder.

Often Bella or Winny will visit with Ollie when he's snuggling into their hay. He likes to sniff noses with Winny, but Bella is a little more persistent about her kisses and sometimes chases him out of the pen!

Retreat!

Winny is sticking her tongue out for the camera!May and Winny are almost identical - how cute they are!

Thanks for visiting our blog and happy holidays!

Peacable Kingdom

Here our rabbit Tiger Lily and cat Ollie snuggle up during a storm. Originally Ollie went in at feeding time to get some water from Tiger, but then he decided to stay a while and snuggle. It's so wonderful living with so many animals and being able to observe how they all interact!

We have three cats. One ignores the rabbits, one pounces on and plays with them, and Ollie prefers to snuggle! Our yellow lab, Sam, also loves playing with the rabbits. The llamas like sniffing and giving the rabbits rides. What fun we are having this holiday season!

Thanks f0r tuning into the blog! Happy Holidays!

The Herd

This is Birch Tree! She is a little doe from Ethan's third litter this year. She is a fawn, like Ethan. You can identify this color by a light orange body color with white ears, nose, eye rings, and under body.
Here, Winny is being inquisitive about my camera! She followed me all around to see what I was doing and let me catch and pet her while I was visiting.

Bella is teaching Winny about neck-wrestling. Usually two males will neck-wrestle to see who is dominant. It involves biting of each other's legs and underside and then chasing each other around. May and Bella did it when they were younger and in nice cold weather! Today Bella was playing in this fashion with Winny. First she put her ears back and "attacked"!

Winny pulled back: "Ugh! Bella! What are you doing?"

"Hey, get away from my feet!""Mom! Tell Bella to stop!"

"Don't come to me! You tell her to stop!""All right! I'll get you now!""Oh yeah?""I don't know if I like this game any more." *sulks*"Hmm. Is she going to keep going?"

"Does this mean we're at a truce?""For now!"

Arethusa watches all this from the hill, grinning.

What a fun winter day! The llamas love the cold weather because it means they can play!

Ice Storm

Here are some pictures of the ice storm we had here last week! Good thing the llamas had shelter!

Llamas Depart

Today the llamas left Green Mountain College. After four months residency at the college, everyone had been down to the farm to see them, or spotted me walking them around campus! The phrase I heard most often when taking them for walks was "Only at GMC!"

I'm glad they were received so well. They had a wonderful time here. They are now back home with a nice roomy shelter and lots of delicious second-cut hay. They are still browsing on grape vines, lilacs, plum trees, and other tidbits they can find around the yard. Winny enjoys pronking up and down the hill!

I will include pictures soon!

Thanks for visiting our blog!

Winny's Training

I haven't had the experience of training a young llama since 2002 when Bella came to our herd. What fun it is to learn about how little Winny reacts to her training! Until she was about five months old she did not enjoy being touched by people but walked wonderfully on a halter. I respected her personality and age and decided not to push her until she was six months old when she was a little more developed. Last week I started walking Winny around school by herself and training her to the command "stand" when people wanted to pet her. To my delight, she stood perfectly still and was quite content to be touched. This week I took her out for about 10 minutes and introduced her to getting her feet picked up. She stood still and kept her ears up the whole time! We ended on a good note - I picked up each foot twice and she was very good about it!

I'm very pleased with the way Winny is coming along in her training. It's fun to learn about how each individual animal reacts to certain training techniques and circumstances that arise while we are training (for example flags, skateboards, and bicycles - all of which Winny is now quite accustomed to!). She is so much fun to work with!

New Addition to White Mountain Llamas

Today I traveled through wind and rain and snow (for real!) to pick out our new angora bunny. In September I brought WML's fawn buck, Ethan Allen, to visit Autumn, a tort doe at the Smith Family Farm. Autumn had a litter of 8 bunnies, all torts and fawns. My sister and I love this beautiful golden-red color and have picked out a bunny donned "Birch" as our newest addition. You can see Birch and her siblings at Katie Smith's website. We are so excited about our new baby bunny! We will pick her up around Thanksgiving.

Rabbits in the Classroom - yes please!


This past Friday I took our buck, Ethan, into school for a presentation in experiential learning. I showed a slide that said the following:

•Angora rabbits are soft
•Adult Angora rabbits are a large breed of rabbit
•Angora rabbits have a friendly disposition
•Angora rabbits produce fiber that can be spun into yarn

I said each one out loud and asked everyone to repeat what I had said. Then I took Ethan out (all 9 pounds plus fiber) and said the same things again. I showed them how to spin his fiber and everyone saw how friendly he was.

I asked everyone if I would have taught them with the slide if they would have remembered the information tomorrow? How about a week from now? I then asked if they would remember the same things through the encounter with Ethan tomorrow or a week from now. They all said that feeling how soft Ethan was experiencing him in the classroom would help them remember information about angora rabbits in the future. I also pointed out that many more questions were generated when I took Ethan out to show people. With the slide I had to stimulate questions and I only received one. What an exciting experience! More on experiential learning later!