Article by Vera Chinese reposted with permission by northforker.com. Photos by Vera Chinese.
Betsy Waugh, a manager at Jason’s Vineyard in Jamesport, had her suspicions that Coco the alpaca was pregnant. But short of an ultrasound, there was no real way to confirm the furry adoptee was in a family way.
That was until Monday morning when Waugh saw that the flock at Jason’s — which includes a dozen baby doll sheep and a male alpaca, Rolo — had grown by one.
“I went out to give them water and all of a sudden there was a baby out there,” Waugh said. “It was the most beautiful thing.”
The little cria (that’s what baby alpacas and llamas are called) came into the world about 11:30 a.m. on one of the hottest days of the year so far.
We reported in September that Rolo and Coco, who were adopted by Jason’s owner Jason Damianos last summer, were separated as the pair had gotten too friendly.
“We think she’s preggers,” Waugh had said at the time. “Or she is getting fat. We don’t know.”
The gestation period for alpacas is more than 11 months, according to alpacas.com, so it would be nearly a year before she would know for sure. Waugh said aside from Coco’s initial weight gain, she barely changed appearance at all.
“She’s just one of those lucky girls,” Waugh said.
It is not clear how much the unnamed baby weighed at birth. It’s sex is unknown as well.
The birth appeared to be an easy for the new mama, who was spotted nuzzling her baby and trotting along the pen with Rolo on Monday afternoon.
“She didn’t look like she was distressed at all,” Waugh said. “It just stood up and started nursing.”
You can see the new family outside the tasting room located at Main Road in Jamesport.