World Alpaca Congress

The first ever international fleece competition was held in conjunction with the Sydney Royal Show and the World Alpaca Congress in Australia this weekend.
With 480 fleeces and over 400 delegats from, throughout the world,
it was a fantastic event.

Silverstream for the first time were able to compete against some of the best fleeces in the world.
To our absolute delight, four of our eight fleeces entered won ribbons against some very tough competition.

Silverstream Fletcher was placed 1st in the 6-12 month brown class
Silverstream First Rate was placed 2nd in the 12-18 month light fawn class
Silverstream Fashion Show was placed 3rd in the 18-30 month medium fawn class
Silverstream Deja Vu was placed 4th in the 18-30 month white class

Fashion Show's 3rd placing was made even more special when it was announced that the Supreme Champion was the animal that beat her in the mid/dark fawn class - Forestglen Seth

Deja Vu's 4th placing was in a very large class of 54 fleeces

Silverstream Fletchers fleece was grid sampled and came back at an amazing
15.8u, 3.5 sd, 15.5sf 22.2cv and 99.6 cf

We now know that NZ can compete successfully against the best fleeces in the world.

Silverstream Czar sold

Silverstream have entered into an arrangement to sell a half share of their champion stud male Silverstream Czar.

Subject to passing screening, Czar will continue his stud career in England. Results of the screening should be known in a few days but it seems academic given his brilliant show career.

Silverstream Czar will leave New Zealand as the undisputed show king.
From 20 shows, Czar won the following:

Supreme Champion - 8
Age Group Champion - 3
Reserve Age Group Champion - 2
2nd placings - 2
3rd placings - 3

There were only two shows in which he was not placed.

2007 was his best year winning supreme champion at the Ashburton, Manawatu and Canterbury Royal shows and Mature Male Champion at the 2007 National Alpaca Expo.
In his only other show for 2007 he was placed third.

His last show, the Canterbury Royal was without the show to remember.

In what was a first for the alpaca industry, Silverstream Czar won Supreme Champion Animal of Show beating off all other livestock.

Not a bad effort for a 48 month old male.

2007 National Alpaca Expo

Silverstream Flashdance (ILR Alpine Fiber's Brutus/Jolimont Rosalinda 2) won Supreme Champion Huacaya at the 2007 National Alpaca Expo. Flashdance in a very close decision beat Cedar House Storm 2 in the Intermediate Male Championship before going on to win the supreme championship. Storm 2 had won supreme at Kumeu and the Auckland Royal making the win even more special.

Silverstream Czar won the Mature Male Championship and Silverstream Foreign Affair won Reserve Intermediate Female Champion.

In the fleece competition, Silverstream fleeces were very much to the fore.
In the 6-12 months section Silverstream won 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th (First Lady, Flashdance, Faberge and Evaki) with Silverstream First Lady winning 6-12 month championship.

Silverstream Fletcher (Champion brown from the National 06) won Reserve Champion fleece in the 6-12 month fleece championship.

Silverstream Edmund won the 12 -24 month fleece championship and then went on and won
Most Valuable Commercial Fleece.

Cambridge Storm Trooper won Rserve Champion fleece in the 48 months and over championship.

A Family of Champions

There is a very special lady at Silverstream who has to be the envy of the alpaca world.
Pucara Juliana (Don Julio/Jolimont Sabrina) now has the distinction of producing four supreme champion progeny from just four progeny. Even Juliana herself was Mature Female Champion at the 2006 National Alpaca Expo and Reserve Mature Champion at the Canterbury Royal 2006. Her progeny won supremes as follows:

Silverstream Boadicea (Benleigh Moonshine) - Supreme Manawatu 2003

Silverstream Czar (ILR Alpine Fiber's Brutus) - Supreme Manawatu, Canterbury &
Nelson 2004, Hawkes Bay 2005, Manawatu 2006, Ashburton, Manawatu
and the Canterbury Royal 2007

Silverstream Deja Vu (ILR Alpine Fiber's Brutus) - Supreme Champion Fleece & Most Valuable
Commercial Fleece Canterbury Royal 2007.

Silverstream Faberge (ILR Alpine Fiber's Brutus) - Supreme Hawkes Bay & Ellesmere 2006

A truly remarkable lady.

Alpaca wins the day

History was created at the recent Canterbury Royal A & P Show. On Friday 16 November 2007,
Silverstream Czar was awarded SUPREME CHAMPION ANIMAL OF SHOW - this was the first time in the running of any A & P Show, let alone a Royal Show that an alpaca had beaten mainstream livestock.

To achieve this milestone, the judge Julie Bird from NSW in Australia had to settle on a winner out of the supreme champion huacaya and supreme champion suri.
Silverstream Czar was then paraded into the main arena representing the alpacas. The competition included 2 sheep (meat & wool), 2 cattle (dairy & beef), 3 horses (in-hand, hack & pony), 1 goat, 1 llama and 1 alpaca.

Three RAS officials then had the difficult job of deciding on an "Best Animal of Show" from the supreme champions of each animal breed.

Czar looked magnificent with his 11 month dense fleece - he also stood so proudly and looked a champion.

Czar thankyou for making your owners ( Kit & Sheryl) so very, very proud and honoured.

It was a momentous day for the alpaca industry and I believe recognition of the contribution alpacas are now making in the New Zealand show rings of the A & P Society.

Embryo Transfer

Our fifth attempt at embryo transfer has fortunately produced our best result so far. Having had mixed results in the past and with a shortage of recipients, we elected to try single ovulation. Of the eight donors, six produced healthy embryo's and now we wait and hope that the recipients will retain their pregnancies beyond 60 days.With Dr Jane Vaughan's busy schedule both in Australia and overseas, it is unlikely that we will see her back in New Zealand for further embryo transfer in the foreseeable future. This last round of embryo transfer has therefore become very valuable to us. Using our stud sires, ILR Alpine Fiber's Brutus, Jolimont Attitude, Silverstream Czar and Cambridge Storm Trooper we got embryo's from Pucara Juliana, Jolimont Elga, Eringa Park Tessane, Cambridge Bandana, Silverstream Dame Dorado and Chiquita Chantal.Our greatest thrill of the day came first up when Juliana produced a healthy embryo. The dam of Silverstream Boadicea, Czar, Deja Vu and Silverstream Faberge, this was a dream result given the amount of time that Juliana had been empty.Thankyou Jane for all your hard work and enthusiasm.

You only need three legs

In what we believe is a first in New Zealand, Silverstream Dancing Queen has produced a healthy male cria. What makes this birth so special is that the mother only has three legs having had her right rear leg amputated at 3 months of age. Born with a defective rear leg as a result of infection during her pregnancy, Dancing Queen was never able to use her right rear leg.



After encouragement from our vet, we mated Dancing Queen to Silverstream Crusade and to our amazement she not only got pregnant first time, she held the pregnancy all the way through.At no time did she appear to be in any difficulties and she birthed two days before her due date without any complications.Despite recent shearing and cold southerly and wet conditions, both mother and son are doing well.



We continue to be amazed at the marvels of the alpaca.