Heavy Wool

Llamas were domesticated in Andean South America from the guanaco and have carried loads there since before the Spanish arrived. The North American herd is a recent thing by comparison, and it is shrinking.

There were almost 145,000 llamas in the United States in 2002. By 2017 the number had dropped below 40,000.

That decline is the single most useful piece of context for anyone buying one now. It means fewer breeders, fewer shearers who know the coat, and a market where good animals and neglected ones both turn up.

Adults weigh 287 to 600 lb and stand 5 ft 7 in to 5 ft 11 in at the top of the head. Lifespan is 15 to 25 years and some reach past 30. Crias are born at 20 to 31 lb after about 350 days.

The coat is the division: abundant body and neck wool, and leg wool carrying at least to the knee and hock. The undercoat runs 20 to 40 microns.

A heavy wool llama is still normally double coated, so the guard hair is separated out before spinning, and there is simply more fleece to work through than on a lighter animal.

Llamas are more independent than alpacas and less tied to a herd, which is exactly why they work as guardians and as pack animals and why they are easier to keep in small numbers.

They are handled in a halter, and a llama that leads well is a different animal to own from one that does not. Halter training is the thing to ask about, not an afterthought.

They spit when displeased, usually at each other. They have nails rather than hooves.

Males reach sexual maturity at around three years.

Fiber, principally. This is the llama to buy if the fleece is the reason.

They can pack and guard like any llama, but the coat argues against hard work in heat, and a heavily woolled animal in a hot summer needs watching.

Company. Another llama for preference, and failing that the stock they are guarding. A llama on its own is a llama with nothing to do.

Annual shearing, toenail clipping, teeth checks and a parasite plan.

That plan has to name meningeal worm if you are in the eastern United States. White-tailed deer carry it and are unharmed by it, snails and slugs pass it on, and in a llama it shows as uncoordinated movement, lameness, and then paralysis and blindness. Treatment is repeated high doses of anthelmintics with steroids and supportive care, it is very hard to treat, and it can fail. It can only be confirmed after death. Prevention is deer-proof fencing, clearing thick ground cover, and keeping animals off ground where snails and slugs sit.

Fencing that keeps deer out is doing two jobs at once, which is worth remembering when you cost it.

Understand what the coat commits you to. Shearing is not optional on a heavy wool llama, and a missed year is a welfare problem rather than a missed harvest. Find your shearer before you buy the animal, not after.

Heat is the other consideration. In a hot climate this is the coat that causes trouble, and buyers in the south should think hard about it.

Handle the fleece and ask about last year's clip, including how much guard hair had to come out.

Ask whether it is halter trained and who trained it. With an animal of 300 lb or more this is not a refinement.

Ask about the coat by name. A seller who cannot tell you which wool division their llama shows in probably has not thought about the fleece, which matters whether or not you intend to use it.

Recent sale prices on HoofnHorn, where there are any, are further down this page.