The Name Game...

We've had close to 90 cria born now since we started raising alpacas.  We are always getting questions about how we come up with names for them all.  Heck, this is a question I'm often asking or wondering of other alpaca breeders too!  Some have definitely been more challenging then others.  We have a few themes we like to use.  Sometimes a name just pops in your head when you see that cria and it sticks.  Sometimes one will go quite awhile with no official name and lots of little nicknames get attached, some that stick and are always used regardless of what that long official, sometimes stuffy name might be.  And of course, they are all little punkin's! 

One angle is to incorporate the Herd Sires name into the cria's name, especially when it's a superstar stud and you want to highlight that.  With Snowmass Golden Victory we wanted to connect him to all his cria and have used Golden in the girls names and Victory in the boys name.  Here's a few of the 2011 GV crop so far this year... 


Moonshadow's Golden Treasure, purchasing her mom
set us on a very calculated path to result in this girl, plus
her aloofness suits this name~

 

Moonshadow's Victory's Klondike, this guy is built
like a brick and dense as can be, plus has some hidden
gold color in that fleece~

 

Moonshadow's Victory's Spirit, first off he is full of
spirit, not to mention he definitely shows off what we
hoped to see in Golden Victory offspring~

We actually have a running list of potential names.  Sometimes it is useful and we find something we like that seems to suit the personality of the new cria.  Just as often, it seems like the list grows longer then any of them get used.  Then when it comes to boys we try to factor in something that could be "studly" with some fun marketing potential.  Or do we just have a fun name that suits the personality of a boy who will be a wonderful fiber producer. 

Moonshadow's Crockett, quite the character and adventurer, always seems
 to be in the midst of everything and loves to be in front of the camera~

Sometimes we have that special female, like Moonshadow's Obsession aka MO, who we want to recognize in the naming of her cria.  Our "MO line" that I've mentioned in past blogs.  MO's cria are some of those very few that might actually have a name picked out before they are born.  This could be tricky sometimes not knowing whether you are having a boy or a girl, so far we've lucked out and had a gender appropriate name picked out.  I will admit when the power of positive thinking fails us, we do have a back up plan.


Moonshadow's Monique, my son threw this name out in
March for MO's cria, we were certainly counting on a girl,
luckily that worked out!  Even though the name came before
the girl it seems to suit her quite well~

For those who always wonder how do we keep track of them all, we keep lists of course!  All of our cria are registered, so we do have the ARI database record.  We also use a herd management database to manage our herd.  To keep things simple, we have recorded birth dates and names of every cria born at Moonshadow on the nursery barn wall.  Always impressive when the vet or company asks about a specific DOB and we can quickly come up with it.  ;-)  For us, it's just a nice visual on how far we've come since we started in 2002.