# Alpaca choke



## alpacamom (Jan 28, 2007)

We're occasionally having trouble with 2 of our white male alpacas coughing/vomiting when eating grain. We give them about 3/4 lb in the bottom of a bucket that hooks over the bars of the panels every morning and every now and then, one of them will cough, throw his head up and down, and vomit. It only happens to Newman (3, I think) and Monte (11 months old) and they're both white. It doesn't happen to the dark brown or light brown boys. At first we thought it was because we would put DE in the grain, but when we had to put a new bag in the empty storage bucket, we didn't add DE this time.

What are we doing wrong? Why would this be happening?


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## kesoaps (Dec 18, 2004)

Are they eating too fast? Sometimes when they gulp down their grain, my sheep have done the same thing. You can try putting some big rocks in; they tend to slow down to eat around rocks. Obviously, nothing so small that they'll eat it up with the grain...


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## cath (Mar 13, 2004)

After an expensive vet visit for choke last spring I learned it is caused by the camelids eating too fast. Since they really don't chew they basically swallow the grain whole. Then the clump gets caught in their long esophagus. We almost lost an alpaca that night, a friend of mine did lose an alpaca to choke around the same time.

Now we spread their grain out in their pasture so they have to "graze" the grain. It slows them down and they can't get as much into their mouth at one time.

We've had no incidents or near misses since starting this technique. Let me know your experiences. What brand do you feed?


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## alpacamom (Jan 28, 2007)

I noticed today in the little boy pen that the white one eats slower than the brown, so the brown tries to push his way into the white one's bucket, so the white one was probably eating too fast. I'm sure the same happens in the big boy pen, too. 

I don't know if rocks in our grain buckets would work, but can certainly give it a go. The buckets aren't all that big, so I might have to try a different method of feeding.

Cath, when you put the grain in the pasture, how do you make sure everyone is getting the right amount? Since I only have 4 here right now, it's easy for me to make sure they don't get over/under fed since each has his own bucket. As the herd increases, I'm sure that will change though! We feed Evans Alpaca Maintenance Kiblet by Kent.


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## kesoaps (Dec 18, 2004)

I'd be concerned about grain in the pasture because of the increased parasite risk. I don't know about the alpacas, but my sheep have a tendency to poop in their food  It gets rather difficult to find areas to put down fresh hay, let alone grain.


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## alpacamom (Jan 28, 2007)

kesoaps, one nice thing about alpacas is that they have a community dung pile and only have a few of them around the pasture rather than just dumping wherever they happen to be at that moment. The LGDs OTOH.....


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## kesoaps (Dec 18, 2004)

That is nice. I don't recall if my llamas did that or not. I know the horses do. Sheep are messy and don't give a rat's behind where they go :grump:


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## cath (Mar 13, 2004)

Yes, the communal poop pile makes it easy to graze them and collecting poop for the garden is much easier! If only they hadn't decided that one of their piles had to be in their shelter! Once they pick a spot, it's impossible to try and get them to choose another place.

Since the alpacas love their grain, I give each a small spread-out pile on the ground or where their hay is spread out. This way they don't bicker over who gets the grain. I think they all get approximately the same amount.

We were feeding Mazuri llama blend but our feed store is now carrying Nutrena llama/alpaca maintenance pellets. The animals don't seem to notice the difference.


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## Corky (May 11, 2002)

The amount of grain you are feeding concerns me.
My alpacas get a half cup of alpaca feed once a day in summer and twice a day in winter. This is to give the proper vitamins needed.
It is a pelleted feed and believe it or not it is Bluebonnet alpaca feed and has big pellets instead of the usual small ones.
They used to choke on the small ones but never choke on the big ones.
They do like to use them for amo in duels though. I have ducked a bullet more than once when they are fighting over their feed.
Ours are fed in individual dishes. Fat on an alpaca is very bad. You should not be able to pinch fat on there undersides.
Before you say they are not getting enough to eat... first we were told that a cup of feed a day was plenty and if DH gets lazy and just guesses and gets too much in their dishes they will leave it.
Heck, we don't give our Donkey any grain at all in the Summer and she is still fat.
In the winter she gets a cup a day. That's it. That is per Vet instructions and she is healthy but still a little on the fat side.
She gains weight on air.


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