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How to Fill a Pasture By Frank Gabriel While still living and working in New Jersey, my wife Geri and I decided to vacation at a friends house in Maine. As you so often do, we planned various activities, one of which was a visit to the Common Ground Fair in Unity, Maine. We were just about to leave for the fair when I picked up a real estate book from the area and saw a picture of what I thought was one of the most beautiful properties I had ever seen. After mentioning it to Geri, we decided to stop and look at it on the way to the fair. We found the farm in Pittston and sat at the top of the hill overlooking 10 acres of fields and a 178 acre pond for the better part of the day. I think we decided that day that this was the place for us. Little did we know that this would be the start of an 8 year odyssey which we are still living today. The following day, we visited the fair and a few of the exhibitors were alpaca breeders. We have been to many a fair in Maine and have always been drawn to these fuzzy creatures. There was still no connection in our minds between yesterday's farm and today's alpacas. Sometimes you need an anvil to fall on your head! To make a long story short, we purchased the farm. We commuted from New Jersey for a while on weekends, retired and finally moved to Maine full time all to live on our farm by the lake. It was great. OK, we are here, now what are we going to do with this farm? We looked at all varieties of farm animals. However, there was a certain criteria that had to be met after all, we were retired. The investment had to be one which was not a lot of work, would offer a good return on our money and was fun to do. Hello! How about alpacas? By the way, the tax shelters far exceeded my expectations. 
After having fencing installed and building a walk in shelter, we brought our first alpacas home
in June 2001. We started with two bred females and a maiden with the promise of a breeding when
she came of age. We planned future breedings, we purchased more females and before we knew it,
we outgrew our little farm. After a very long search we found our present 60 acre farm in
beautiful Thorndike, Maine.We have been in our new home (built in 1846) for about a year and a half. Initially we had the boys and girls pastured on the south side of the house. After much planning and hard work, we now have five new pastures for our girls with housing on the north pasture. We also built an isolation area with housing for incoming females waiting to be bred on our farm. Once these alpacas are tested and cleared they can be released into an adjoining pasture which is just for visitors. They seem to love the sloping terrain. We are in our fifth year and now have nineteen alpacas of our own and four boarders on the farm. Each one is special and every day one or more of them will do something that makes you chuckle. We have met some wonderful people along the way and we would not change anything about our decision to become alpaca breeders. These animals are magical. |
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