The
notation methods used to identity an alpaca and its lineage can be a
little confusing when first encountered. In order to better
understand how this information is coded, lets take as an example, an
alpaca with the identification as shown below. The explanation of
the individual terms follows.
"123456"
is the registration number of this alpaca. The Alpaca
Registry Incorporated (ARI), maintains our country's alpaca
registration database. This number is also referred to as
the ARI Number.
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"White"
is the primary color of the blanket of this alpaca. Less
predominate secondary and tertiary colors can also be identified
and listed as the second and third colors. For example, a
black alpaca with a white face should be shown as TB/WH ("True
Black/White").
"USA"
means this alpaca was born in the USA. Some of the other
possible countries of origin include Peru, Chile, Bolivia,
Australia, New Zealand, and Germany.
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The full (real) name of the alpaca in
this example is "A.L. Paca's Peruvian Iamnotallama".
The abbreviated name is Iamnotallama.
Each full
name must be unique. For example, there might be an
alpaca by the name of "Smith Farms Blackie" and another by the
name of "Jones Ranch Blackie". Smith Farms and Jones
Ranch are the breeder identifiers which makes Blackie a unique
alpaca name in the ARI registration database for each of these
two breeders.
As shown
above, "A.L. Paca's" and "Peruvian" are the additional
identifiers used in this alpaca's name.
Some people
think it is difficult to name a few children. Well,
imagine trying to appropriately name several dozen alpaca babies
a year!
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The word
Peruvian is used here to indicate this alpaca's
full heritage is from Peru. Other words commonly used
are Chilean (for an alpaca of full Chilean heritage), Bolivian
(full Bolivian heritage), and Accoyo (to indicate an alpaca
who's full heritage is from the famous Accoyo farm in Peru).
Although the word
Peruvian is used here to show this alpaca is of 100% Peruvian
heritage, it can get slightly confusing as the word Peruvian was
also used to identify an alpaca imported from Peru. In
this later case, there would not be a breeder identifier in the
alpaca's name.
There were a total
of 7 importations of alpacas from Peru before imports were
closed. The importers used the following method to
identify alpacas brought in during each of the imports.
"A.L.
Paca's" is the breeder identifier for this alpaca.
This is the name of the breeder, farm, or ranch, who owned the
dam at the time of conception. As shown in this example,
A.L. Paca's owned Iamnotallama's mother when Iamnotallama was
conceived. Since A.L. Paca's made the breeding decision,
we are the breeder, and the ARI will allow us to put our breeder
identifier on Iamnotallama's ARI certificate. Our farm
uses either A.L. Paca's or ALP which is just a TLA (three letter
acronym) for our farm.
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Pedigree Example
· Grandfather,
the alpaca's father's father
· Father
(Country of Origin, Primary Color/Secondary Color, ARI Number)
·Mother
(Country of
Origin, Primary Color/Secondary Color, ARI Number)
· Grandmother,
the alpaca's mother's mother
Shown to the right is an
Alpaca Registry Incorporated (ARI) certificate for one of our herdsires
(Peruvian Eclipse). The certificate shows that Eclipse descends
from full Peruvian lineage. His sire "4Peruvian Midnight Express
6000" was imported from Peru during the 4th Peruvian import. His
dam "4Peruvian Brillante 6690" also came in during this same import.
The certificate lists both sire and dam as TB (True Black) in color.
This color is very rare for alpacas from Peru which are almost entirely
white or fawn in color.
Although you will see the
information on the ARI certificate is formatted a little differently
than shown in our Pedigree Example above, the information presented is
basically the same. We have just rearranged some items to make the
lineage more easy to read on a web page.
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