The newborn lamb, just two hours old, was already standing. I wasn’t sure if it was real; it was so soft white and cuddly as a baby’s stuffed animal. All around the spacious pen, exotic turkey, peacock, geese, ducks, and sheep mingle  There was no crying– only a lot of baahing, quacking, and ringing wind chimes to herald the arrival of one more creature to this peaceable kingdom at Breezy Hill in Woodbine, Maryland.

Amid the chaos, Heather Lysantri, resplendent in a purple and orange tunic, strides out of her 2-story home across the lawn, to greet me. But first she goes right into the middle of the animal fest to check on the state of the newborn which still has its umbilical cord hanging

“It’s ok. It’s nursing,” she says as she settles down at a picnic table in front of the rebuilt silo, to talk about how this animal kingdom has blossomed. Five lambs have been born this spring, she says. And six more cria (baby alpaca) are on the way.

This is a way of life that goes beyond a hobby even though both Heather and her husband Alex Lysantri still maintain full time jobs to support the farm and their two children. “We still have to find the time to build it up,” says Heather. “We had originally set this up for horses. Then we discovered alpacas.”

 Neither she nor her husband Alex has taken a vacation together for years. It has become a mission, far from the original career goal of her 20s when she envisioned a career as a professional pool player in New York City.

But farming was in her blood, ever since she herself grew up on a farm in Bluemont, Virginia. She and Alex, who was familiar with raising chickens and other domestic birds in Cyprus where he grew up, were intent on finding a farm to raise horses. They bought Breezy Hill in Woodbine, Maryland, through a short sale in 2009.

Heather lined up riding lessons for her young children and for herself. On the third lesson, two weeks before moving to the farm, Heather fell off a horse and broke her humerus, the upper arm bone. “It was a long and painful recovery,” Heather recalls. The injury took the idea of a horse-riding center off the table.

At first glance, alpaca would seem to be an odd, if not random, choice. Heather recalls years before they bought the property, she had talked to a man who promoted alpaca for the business potential of their wool and their pleasant disposition. She and Alex investigated and decided to invest in three alpacas for sale in nearby Frederick. It was a good deal– for three when they then cost much more on the market for just one. “Back then it was a pretty exotic market.  You could get good money for breeding them and you could sell their fur for fiber products, “explains Heather.

But the first group of alpaca turned out to be “awful.”  One was obese, one was old and the worst one suffered from an ill temper known as berserk syndrome. Berserk is one of the many idiosyncratic features of alpaca, usually known to be docile pets. It occurs in males that have been bottle-fed. “When they reach full maturity, they think everything with legs is a threat. They chase, they bite. He charged us all the time,” Heather pauses. “We traded them for five peacocks.”

As for the alpaca that year, the couple realized they needed to invest in better stock. They bought five alpacas” above pet quality.”  The herd has now grown to 20 with many ribbons and medals for wool and quality of the animals.

We walk down to see the alpaca which live and forage free-range in the paddocks behind the house. They seem happy and goofy as they nuzzle and ogle us with their big brown eyes and flickering eyelashes. They have just been shorn of their fluffy, warm coats, a routine in May. They yielded huge bags of fur that Heather will blend into threads and yarns for weaving.

She points to Motion, who has won 13 championships, including the Grand Champion in the White class, a kind of best in group award. Today, shorn of fur, he looks skinny and awkward as a boy with his first crewcut.

“He’s got perfect conformation,” Heather points out. The distance of his legs is equal to the distance across his back, from his tail to neck. But more important, his wool is prime, “all in clumps, fine and soft.” She’s got a huge bag of Motion’s fleece to enter in this fall’s shows.

Alpacas crashed the gates in mating season

As native of the Andes, the alpaca cannot cope with the extreme heat and cold of Maryland when they are delivering offspring. Heather and Alex separate the boys from the girls except for the mating season so they can time the births in temperate weather of spring or fall. However, one day when the couple was driving home last year from an alpaca show, they noticed that the alpaca had broken through the fence.

 “We had two gate crashers,” recalls Heather. “One alpaca was very horny. I saw more and more pairing.  It resulted in five babies.”  One mother and baby died in the summer due to the heat.

The alpaca are organic, feeding on grass and some special grain made for their nutritional needs.

How do they produce champions? “Mostly, it’s the genetics,” says Alex, a mix of strong males with smaller, less perfect females. “Nothing is guaranteed. They judge on conformation and density of the wool.”

Alex is legendary in the neighborhood located in the Maryland Agricultural Reserve for his knack with birds and animals. He sells chickens, roosters and peacocks from pens behind the barn. His customers call him for advice, which can range from how to shield birds from predators to why a hen is not laying eggs.

Alpaca care has had its learning curve, but the Woodbine couple has mastered the fine points. They call the vet for emergencies but have found meds for horses and alpaca are interchangeable.

Overall, the alpaca offers many products for business: wool and offspring. But the most exciting potential lies in their manure, which Heather calls “black gold.”

Black Gold in the manure mine

 “I attended a poo seminar, and I was blown away by this class. They could pay all their expenses of raising the alpaca by selling manure,” explains Heather. Alpaca manure, an all-natural, organic fertilizer, deters deer and insects in addition to boosting growth of all kinds of vegetables and flowers. At the seminar, the program leaders planted tomatoes in the manure to demonstrate its power to boost crops. “They had cables going up to the second floor” of the building to support the massive tomatoes,” says Heather.

Alex and Heather bought the gear and supplies to make bricks of the manure, which they expect to invest in once they retire. Every morning they rake the pasture and pile up the manure in the compost which they will spread over the fields.

They have discovered the power of alpaca manure for themselves. Last spring Alex carefully tilled the fields for grazing and lined them with alpaca manure. After a rain, the field filled with little yellow buttercups. Nothing but buttercups—toxic for the alpaca and most grazing animals. They uprooted the buttercups, reseeded and refertilized with the black gold for a healthy, organic grazing field.

From shearing to cape

The couple set up a studio and shop in the property’s converted barn and silo. They send some of the raw wool off to be sorted, fluffed and cleaned to Painted Sky Mill in Pennsylvania . The debris is removed from the fiber to ensure that the best is used for yarn, leaving the rest for roving or bond spinning. Heather keeps some of the fleece to process herself into threads and yarns. These go into a variety of fiber art

which is sold in the Little Boutique, where we end up. The shop displays socks, scarves and other warm products. Some are made by commercial shops, such as the stuffed alpaca toys, but all contain alpaca wool, known for its warmth and softness.

The most stunning operation occurs in Heather’ studio, located behind the shop. It houses a Felt LOOM Proseries machine that blends the refined alpaca fleece with other materials to make some beautiful, brightly colored designs. Heather may add some mohair or silk for texture, or to add structure.

“I love this machine!” Heather enthuses.

She places the fleece on top of a material decorated with peacock feather eyes. The loom, with over 900 needles, weaves the wool with the material into a warm, felt-like cover.

It seems a big jump from the plastic bags of fleece lined up outside the door to these works of art. But like the alpaca, it’s soft, warm and engaging.

Breezy Hill is open for tours. You can contact them at breezyhillalpacas@gmail.com or call (410)489-5802.