This is a story about a female alpaca that was born 278 days after conception. First, I would like to present the facts:

Lacey, the mother, is 10 years old. She typically delivers after 335-337 days gestation.

Lacey’s last cria was born 4/26/03.

Lacey was rebred on 5/29/03. She was bred one time. I waited an extra week to rebreed her because I like to batch all the deliveries together and wanted to push them a little later into the Spring. At the time she was bred I was working with seven females. She bred the same day as three other females by introducing them each, one at a time, to separate males in large barn stalls. Lacey is not one of those "iffy" females. She either drops like a rock to be bred or she paints you green! Prior to this week, no breeding had occurred for this season.

Now, here is what happened . . .

I wanted to worm all of the ladies before we entered the last two months of pregnancy. So, on Monday, March 1, 2003, nine weeks before the first due date, I wormed all of the ladies with Synathic. All of the ladies are used to being handled a lot on our farm and this was a total nonevent.

Two days later, Wednesday, March 3, 2003, I was working my way through my usual morning feeding routine, but was running a little late because I was worming and trimming toes on a few boys each day. Finally, a little before eleven o’clock, I went down to the ladies pen to call them up to the barn for breakfast. The ladies came out of the pen and headed for the field instead of the barn . . . a little unusual, but I was running so late, I figured they had given up on breakfast and just wanted to get on with their day. Except Lacey. She was sitting further down the fence line and was not getting up. Then, I noticed there was something sticking out of her back-end and realized there was a real problem. Assuming that she was miscarrying, I headed up to the barn to get a halter and lead. When I returned, I could see that there was a head and feet present. I haltered her up and led her to the barn with Talley, her last cria, following along. I gathered some supplies and put her in the chute to see what I was dealing with, knowing without doubt that the cria was already dead. I mean really, this was nine weeks early . . .

The presentation appeared normal except there was a lot of blood and one foot was a little further back. I pulled on the foot a little to see if it was locked somewhere. Lacey spit and there was a gasp! I stood there looking shocked. But, there was no further movement from the cria so I thought "naw, it must have just been a reflex from Lacey spitting." I pulled on the foot again and it did it again! There was still no movement or signs of life so, I thought it was just my imagination. I put Lacey back in the stall and set about waiting to see what would happen next. Within five minutes Lacey gave a push, and out plopped the baby, who then, to my astonishment, proceeded to thrash its legs and head.

I wasn’t exactly set up for deliveries yet. Mentally or physically. I headed off to the house to get some towels. I was incredulous that the baby was alive and also, certain that it would not survive. It was a girl. I was really bumbed out. This is not how I wanted to start the season. I have been looking forward to having a record eight babies this spring. The highlight of my year.

I arrived back at the barn to find this little girl sitting sternal, struggling to hold her head up. Tears came to my eyes as I thought, "wow, she really thinks she has a chance. Aren’t they amazing?" I rubbed her down with towels, checked Lacey and set about to watch the cria die. She had her rubbery little boots, no teeth and was really struggling to breathe. Oddly though, her ears were straight and the membrane was completely detached from her face and body. She weighed a little under 9 lbs. It was really drafty that day in the barn so, I decided I would get the hair dryer. At least she didn’t have to be cold. I bundled her up in my quilted shirt and started blowing warm air into one end. She seemed to be responding to the heat and my touching her legs. But her breathing was very labored. I went in and called the vet. He suggested that I strip Lacey’s teats and see if she had milk. If she did not, that the baby would need to be tubed. I thought, "Ok, the vet is not doing the math on this one . . . " But, I do what I’m told. I thawed out the frozen cow colostrum and got my tube. I stripped Lacey’s teats. She was not impressed! And of course, there was no milk.

I have never had to tube anybody. I watched someone else do it one time. And recently, I had printed out several posts from Alpacasite where detailed instructions had been posted. I figured at least I would give it a try. I gave her 30 mils of colostrum about 1:00 p.m. and continued blow drying her. Mom and I waited for her to take her last gasp of air for the rest of the afternoon. Her little lips would puff out with every exhale. At about 4:00 p.m. I called the vet again and gave him an update. He said that she would need more intensive care than he could provide and suggested that I talk to Pilchuck Veterinary. He also said I may as well take her in the house at that point. There was no way she would make it in the barn with me and a blow dryer all night. I took her in and put her in front of the heater in the bathroom. This is the only room where I could keep six wet, black canine noses away from her. After she got really warm, she perked up a little and was breathing a lot easier. But she was still very limp and flat.

Pilchuck Hospital paged a vet and Dr. Laura Hradec called me back. She said that she had seen four week early premies make it, but not nine week premies. She said that they would advise a plasma infusion, antibiotics and drugs to bring in mom’s milk.

It was apparent at this point that whatever was happening with this little girl, she had her own expectations about her survival. I could not in good conscious, take that away from her. I called my husband at work and told him what was going on and waited for him to get home. By the time he got through rush hour, hooked up the trailer and loaded Lacey, it was 7:00 p.m. and we had a two-hour drive ahead of us.

As we drove, I held the baby in my lap, still bundled up in my shirt. Before we left, I had tubed her again and given her another 30 mils of cow colostrum. The warmer she got the more active she became. An hour into the trip she was holding her head up and struggling with her legs. By the time we got to Pilchuck she seemed to be trying to nurse under my chin. Dr. Laura met us there and I said to her as I carried the baby in, that she seemed to be wanting to nurse. While I held her, they took her temperature and mixed up a bottle of kid milk replacer. It was 9:00 p.m. They put the bottle to her mouth, she glompt onto it and sucked every drop down! I knew that nobody really believed that my dates could be correct . . . except that she was so small . . .

They gave her some antibiotics, plasma into the abdomen, started Lacey on oxytocin and promised to call in the morning. The next morning the phone rang and Dr. Laura said "She is still with us!" She was weak but still taking the bottle. Lacey now had milk in all four quadrants. She would try to get blood for an IgG and the results would take 24 hours. She promised to call at the end of the day. The next day was the same. Then the IgG came back. One hundred meant failure of passive transfer. She was given plasma again on Friday and we picked her up Saturday afternoon and took her and Lacey home.

We live in a house with a daylight basement. We set up a pen using stock panels in the basement. The cria came home with a cradle Dr. Laura had set up. It was a Styrofoam cooler with both ends cut out. She had hot water bottles, towels, blankets and a heat lamp. She was to be fed every 4-6 hours, 30-60 cc of milk and given antibiotics twice a day. I was to give her physical therapy, track her temperature and keep her warm, clean and dry, strip Lacey’s milk each time I fed the baby and instructed to write down everything. At the time of discharge she weighed about 8.7 lbs. Lacey was unimpressed with my milking skills and set about redecorating the walls and ceiling in the basement. Otherwise, the first evening was fine.

I staggered to the basement at 3:00 a.m. to give the baby a bottle and found her sitting in the middle of the 8'x8' pen. Not in the warm box under the heat light with her water bottles! I put her back in the box and fed her, then I went back to bed. I called Dr. Laura in the morning and asked her how important it was for her to stay in the box . . . should I add rocks on top of the blankets or what? By that afternoon, I had installed a new, bigger and better box. She was not getting out of this one! She could push herself up onto her feet but she could not stay on her feet very long. This box was high enough that she could just get her head up over the sides while standing . . . unless, she was standing on all the blankets! Why, if she stood on all the blankets, she could heft one leg up and over the sides and then, if she pushed with her little fanny, she could plop herself 2 feet down to the carpeted concrete floor. By the way, did I mention the house we live in is not complete? None of the floors in the house are finished. We have concrete in the basement and plywood upstairs. Except of course, in the alpaca suite downstairs. I sent John out to get some carpet because the baby was sliding on the straw-covered tarp on the floor. The next morning, I reported to Dr. Laura that evidently, alpacas do not belong in boxes. I replaced the box with a drawer. The drawer is to contain the blankets, not the baby. It does a really good job containing the blankets and the baby can walk right out of it and she does . . . walk!

Yesterday, the baby walked all about, just like any baby would on the day it is born. She is up to 9.4 lbs. She would probably be interested in nursing mom except that she is not tall enough to reach and mom doesn’t like me holding the baby underneath her. She likes the bottle just fine but she would like to see more of them and more in them. She is maintaining her temperature without the heat lamp (she is still in the house of course), and today she discovered that if you pee standing up, you don’t get all wet! I let her go outside in the front yard with her mom for a while today. The sun was shining and it was a beautiful Spring day. She got to see the rest of the herd through the fence. I think she was a little surprised there were 39 alpacas outside. She thought alpacas lived in the house.

For all intents and purposes, if you did not know her history and you saw her today, you would think she was just born yesterday or today. She is oddly small, and has these funny little dried and curled up toes. She breathes a little heavier, but you might not even notice that. Frankly, I’m not even sure she does, but I think she breathes a little heavier. What will happen tomorrow? I don’t know. All I know is that she is here and today she is one week old. I finally named her today. Her name is Wanda. She is the Wanda Baby. I always Wanda what she is doing. I Wanda how it is possible she is even here. And KING TVs’ Wanda Wanda was my favorite childhood entertainer of the sixties.

I would also like to say this. This is the first crisis we have had on this farm. I have lots of book learning but no practical experience about alpaca emergencies. I try to be prepared for anything. Recently Kirsten Kraushaar, Soulfood Alpacas, had a crisis with a cria named Subzero. She posted her emergency on Alpacasite. There were several very specific posts that were addressing the emergencies she was having. If it were not for Kirsten, Subzero, and other contributors to Alpacasite, Wanda probably would not be sitting in my basement gumming a piece of hay right now. I had printed out the instructions on tubing and blood sugar and used them both on Wanda. One night Wanda was limp when I went down to get her and weigh her. Maybe she was just really, really asleep, but that Karo on her gums sure woke her up!

This story is dedicated to Subzero.

Update: March 2005. Wanda turned a year old this week. There are seven crias including her and you would never be able to tell which one was born prematurely. When she was about 5 months old she had a very high temperature that lasted for several days. The vet asked why I had taken her temperature in the first place and I said, "well she was whining and acting needy". What this translates to, is I still keep one eye on this little girl at all times. He put her on antibiotics for 10 days and she charged her way through what ever the bug was. I used to carry pellets around with me so that I could give her a little extra food. She would eat them one at a time. It was like feeding a slot machine. We stopped doing that once she was about 6 months old to discourage bad manners.