- Alpaca breeders have long noticed that as they breed for incremental fleece fineness in their animals, the standard deviation of diameter among those fibers also tends to decrease, the result of an apparent and generally favorable genetic link (or links) behind these economically important phenotypic traits. However, because the uniformity measurements they rely upon do not segregate it, they have generally paid less attention to directly managing the genetic sources of micron uniformity that are not linked to those that contribute to incremental fineness. This has been true even though those unrelated genetic sources of uniformity appear to be nearly as important to micron uniformity as those that also contribute to fineness. more »
- If any of the assertions below contradict what you believe about alpaca base coat color genetics, it’s definitely worth reading this blog post and continuing on to a very friendly, fun-loving statistical analysis that is available in our website’s library! 1. First, all white alpacas can produce color when they are bred to it. There is no such thing as a homozygous dominant white animal. In fact, a pink-skinned white is in some ways as recessive a creature as a true black. 2. What’s more, many fawns are not just “dilute” but carry a white base coat color allele, which acts to dilute a brown allele in the production of the phenotypic coat color. You can actually breed two fawns together and get a homozygous white. 3. White breeders, no need to rely on those pure-white pedigrees to make sure you don’t produce fawns and browns. Turns out a brown allele can’t really hide itself well phenotypically. 4. Color breeders, to introduce white genetics into a color breeding program with lower odds of producing white offspring, breed that white animal to brown. The darker, the better. more »
- Alpacas, South American camelids, will be used for the rehabilitation of children with disabilities in Zootherapy Centre at the University of Information Technology and Management in Rzeszów. For over a year the university has the only alpaca farm in Poland. more »
- Evaluating the attributes of alpaca fleeces subjectively by eye is difficult and unreliable as alpaca fleeces show large variations in attributes. In addition, our eyes (and brain) are limited in their ability to discern fibre diameter, the average of other attributes and the extent of naturally occurring contaminants. Alpaca fleeces are also affected by environmental conditions, in particular humidity, but also by storage conditions. These same limitations apply equally to wool, mohair and cashmere. more »
- Bactrian camel (Camelus bactrianus), dromedary (Camelus dromedarius) and alpaca (Vicugna pacos) are economically important livestock. Although the Bactrian camel and dromedary are large, typically arid-desert-adapted mammals, alpacas are adapted to plateaus. Here we present high-quality genome sequences of these three species. Our analysis reveals the demographic history of these species since the Tortonian Stage of the Miocene and uncovers a striking correlation between large fluctuations in population size and geological time boundaries. Comparative genomic analysis reveals complex features related to desert adaptations, including fat and water metabolism, stress responses to heat, aridity, intense ultraviolet radiation and choking dust. Transcriptomic analysis of Bactrian camels further reveals unique osmoregulation, osmoprotection and compensatory mechanisms for water reservation underpinned by high blood glucose levels. We hypothesize that these physiological mechanisms represent kidney evolutionary adaptations to the desert environment. This study advances our understanding of camelid evolution and the adaptation of camels to arid-desert environments. more »