Lilly and Lia look fairly relaxed...don't they?Following the birth of Lia, it was time to cut Lilly’s toenails, which had grown very long and twisted and we were concerned that it might result in lameness. We were reluctant to cut them during the latter part of her pregnancy in fear of causing her any distress.
Alpacas that reside in hard rocky ground in the mountains of Peru will naturally wear their toenails short, whereas ours who live on fairly soft ground need their nails attended to every six months.
Lilly is not the easiest of animals to deal with, in fact she is an absolute nightmare, so whenever we attempt to handle her she will scream, spit and kick and generally make the whole process stressful and traumatic for all of us, her included!!
Having researched dealing with difficult animals we decided that a restraining chute was the answer. So I set about making this implement of torture that you can see in the photographs! (I think I have been watching too many episodes of The Tudors)
Anyway, although it was a bit Heath Robinson, by and large it worked very well and once inside Lilly appeared to be very relaxed, even though her daughter was close by! I was then able to set about cutting her nails with a minimum of fuss!
Some bad news! Little Lia has an umbilical hernia! However, our vet Alonso came over today and is confident that we can deal with it ourselves. An umbilical hernia appears as a soft bulge around the umbilical cord area. There is a defect in the muscles and tissues of the abdominal wall, which feels like a little hole. We have to push back the hernia sac and massage the area 3 times a day for 2 weeks, which will encourage the growth of the muscle, which hopefully will close over the hole.
© Arundahall Restraining Chute(available in 5 colours)
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