Home · Alpacas

Alpacas

Rare and valuable wool

The alpaca, like other fleece-coated animals, originates from a two-coated ancestor. The outer coat, or 'guard hair', is still visible on most alpacas. It can be regarded as a contaminant which impedes processing and dyeing of alpaca fibre, and lessens the quality and appeal of fabrics.

SRS® is a breeding system that will eliminate 'guard hair' from alpacas and will perfect the dimensions and properties of alpaca fibre so that it can become a prestigious and fine fibre, similarly revered as cashmere is, and well positioned in the luxury fibre markets.

We are in the process of genetically reconstructing the alpaca fibre. More than 100 alpaca breeders in Australia, New Zealand, United Kingdom, USA and Canada are involved. The fibre reconstruction is achieved by increasing the density and length of wool fibres, whilst minimising the size of primary fibres.

Figure 1. The fleece of an advanced alpaca of measurably high levels of fibre density and length and fine fibre diameter.

As density and length increases the fleece fibres become highly aligned and uniform in size and shape, and medullation disappears. The fibres become much finer in diameter and smooth surfaced as scale height decreases and scale length increases.

Bred in this way, the alpaca has the potential to produce about 50 times the fleece weight of the cashmere goat.

Advanced alpacas

We have some excellent benchmarks for being able to say when an alpaca has advanced fleece traits. Our worldwide database of leading alpacas from many herds that have been tested for density and length is available. The 309 alpacas, averaging 45 months of age, have the following mean values:

  • fibre density of 43.3 follicles (fibres) per square millimetre
  • fibre length, as measured by growth rate, of 0.34 millimetres per day
  • primary fibres with a mean diameter of 34.7 microns
  • secondary fibres with mean diameter of 24.0 microns

Alpacas sires

Among the alpaca sires we are using in SRS® breeding programs are the following examples (See www.srsalpacas.com.au):

Animal: Jolimont Giovanni
Date of Birth: 07 January 2002
Colour: Solid white
Fibre density: 69.3 follicles per square mm
Fibre length: 0.39 millimetres per day
Primary fibre diamaeter: 30.2 microns
Secondary fibre diameter: 19.5 microns
Fleece weight: 2.7 kilograms at 16.5 microns (12 months of age)

Animal: Protege
Date of Birth: 11 January 1997
Colour: Solid white
Fibre density: 68.2 follicles per square mm
Fibre length: 0.30 millimetres per day
Primary fibre diamaeter: 33.5 microns
Secondary fibre diameter: 22.2 microns

Animal: Mars
Date of Birth: 17 January 2004
Colour: Solid white
Fibre density: 60.9 follicles per square mm
Primary fibre diamaeter: 20.7 microns
Secondary fibre diameter: 17.2 microns
Fleece weight: 2.2 kilograms (12 months of age)

Animal: Accolade
Date of Birth: 11 March 2004
Colour: Solid white
Fibre density: 60.8 follicles per square mm
Primary fibre diamaeter: 25.5 microns
Secondary fibre diameter: 19.1 microns

Animal: Yucatan
Date of Birth: 28 April 2003
Colour: Solid white
Fibre density: 48.8 follicles per square mm
Fibre length: 0.39 millimetres per day
Primary fibre diamaeter: 30.0 microns
Secondary fibre diameter: 22.2 microns

Animal:Alloro
Date of Birth: 01 January 2003
Colour: Solid white
Fibre density: 41.1 follicles per square millimetre
Fibre length: 0.38 millimetres per day
Primary fibre diamaeter: 27.2 microns
Secondary fibre diameter: 18.0 microns
Fleece weight: 3.6 kilograms (2 years of age)