Vermillion Co. 4-H Llama & Alpaca Club

04/29/2026

Kids worked hard at practice tonight! 49 days until show day! 🍀

04/26/2026

Club meetings are so much fun with friends…games, crafts, snacks, and llama education!

04/24/2026

Beautiful night at the farm with our 4-H friends!

04/21/2026

Nice sunny evening for farm chores, trail walk and 4-H family time! 🍀

04/17/2026

Beautiful evening for some showmanship work at the farm! 🍀

04/14/2026

First official practice at the farm! These kids are going to learn so much over the next two months and will be prepared for another great llama and alpaca show at the Vermillion County Fair! Haltering 101 tonight! 🍀

04/11/2026

Herd Health ✅
County Road CleanUp ✅
Baby goat cuddles ✅

04/05/2026

Happy Easter! Some of our club kiddos enjoyed “Bunnies & Bingo” with the residents at Clinton Gardens yesterday!

03/17/2026

A few of our club members enjoyed the Floriculture workshop during spring break! Floriculture is a Project of the Year for 2026!

03/13/2026

The more you know......

FREE TRAINING FRIDAY!

Camelids have three stomach compartments. This means that they are often called “pseudo-ruminants” while the so-called “true” ruminants such as cattle and sheep have 4 stomachs. These camelid compartments (imaginatively called C1, C2, and C3!) allow them to ferment fibrous plants extremely efficiently.

The first compartment, C1, acts like a fermentation vat where microbes break down plant material into nutrients the animal can absorb. This is very like the rumen of cattle and sheep. However, camelids have evolved to be very efficient at this allowing them to thrive even on poor-quality forages.

There are a few key reasons for this efficiency:
1. Rapid absorption of the acidic breakdown products of digestion which helps to stabilise pH in that stomach environment, making it good for the microbes
2. Enhanced nitrogen recycling that supports the microbes
3. Longer retention of feed material in the forestomachs leading to better breakdown of plant cell walls
4. Faster flow of liquids through the first 2 stomach compartments: this means that the microbes need to be more efficient themselves and use less energy!

So really it’s a lot about looking after those microbes! Keep them happy and you have a happy alpaca or llama!

So who’s the “better” ruminant?! I think camelids win hands down on efficiency! Like and comment below!

03/08/2026

Food safety was our club meeting topic today and we baked cupcakes! Thanks Amanda for educating us on food prep safety! 🍀
Fun fact-Foods is one of the Projects of the Year for 2026!

03/07/2026

It was the perfect day to be outside! Our club cleaned up our adopted county road, completed our monthly herd health and went to DQ for dinner!