This September we noticed that one of our alpaca females was suddenly not interested in taking the hard feed we were putting out. She had lost some weight, but we were putting that down to her lactation, her cria was doing so well.

On closer examination it was apparent that she was also anaemic, in fact profoundly so.

Our vet came and took a blood sample, which looked more like cranberry juice than blood. With some foreboding of bad news he went to get samples off to the laboratory. He rang us shortly with the news that the PCV (packed cell volume) was 5% and he was amazed that she was alive let alone walking. Normal PCV is 35%; anaemia is indicated at 26%.

His recommendation was that we had to give her a blood transfusion immediately or she would certainly die.

Polar Bear (stud male of exemplary behaviour) stood still whilst we removed 1 litre of his blood. He was unconcerned and the next day without ill effect. Keeping it warm in bags held next to our skin we took it to our patient and after three attempts at getting a catheter into her jugular vein drip fed it all into her. We followed this up with 5 ml of iron dextran and 5 ml of vitamin/trace elements.

The first results from the lab indicated low copper levels; so we drenched daily with copper chloride and continued with vitamin/trace element injections every 48 hours. Subsequently we have given her a bolus of cobalt, selenium and copper, Cosecure is the trade name. She has improved steadily since then.

In looking for some explanations we had to look at our soil types and elemental analyses. We have been keeping stock at Orchard Farm for more than twenty years. We have had experience with cattle, sheep, and pigs, and as far as we were aware there had been no nutritional problems with any stock that we could link back to our mineral status. Thus when we took delivery of our foundation alpaca stock we felt confident that based on past experience all should be well.

Our first problems developed with a young cria, which gradually fell back in condition and then in vigour. A blood sample assay revealed that this animal was very copper (Cu) deficient. Also low levels of vitamin B12 were recorded, thus implicating low cobalt (Co) in its diet. Treatment with a bolus of Cosecure (cobalt, selenium, copper) resolved the problem and the response was dramatic. Within seven days the animal recovered completely.

At this point we started talking to a company called Trace Element Services and took soil samples for assay. The results were most revealing. Our soil was low in cobalt, normal for copper and zinc, but low in selenium and iodine. It was also high in phosphate, iron and the pH was rather high at 6.9. The low selenium and iodine will affect the utilisation of copper, cobalt and zinc. Iron and phosphate are high and both are antagonistic to selenium, which was already low. The high pH reduces the effect of copper and zinc.

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