Last week we were delighted to host Lola and Ali from Marjan TV Network. Marjan TV Network approached us to shoot an item filming alpaca walking at Spring Farm.
Marjan say they are: ” a pioneering tv brand, pushing the boundaries of World Class Persian television.
We believe life is richer when you’re open to the perspectives and stories of each other. And that’s our promise to you; to always be open. To new voices, ideas and opinions. To new ways of entertaining and thinking. To new opportunities for learning and laughing.”
Wow – so no pressure then for filming alpaca walking!
Anyway, Lola and Ali were a delight to work with and our amazing alpacas were super well behaved. We can’t wait to see the end result and would welcome them back any time.
On the 15th April, Spring Farm Alpacas were delighted to host Josie Gibson and the team from This Morning for an alpaca walk. Josie arrived with a film crew here at Spring Farm Alpacas in East Sussex. Meanwhile, in the studio, Dermot O’Leary and Alison Hammond didn’t really know what they had let themselves in for!
Josie immediately decided that Springfarm Wizard was Dermot’s “spirit animal” and managed to reduce Dermot and Alison to stitches…
For the full live section of the interview look no further:
We were so pleased to be able to showcase alpaca walking and really loved our day with Josie. With thanks to Mr Knightly, Wizard (aka Dermot), Rhubarb and Lazarus.
Josie Gibson with Dermot the alpaca
This Morning filming with Josie Gibson
Josie Gibson filming for This Morning with alpacas
We are so pleased to have finally built an alpaca agility course! After a few years of talking about it, we designed and had built an alpaca (and llama) agility course. When we bought Spring Farm, it was managed as a horse yard. We adapted the stables and out buildings to suit alpacas and llamas. The ménage was almost redundant and has been used to store haylage and farm equipment – until now!
Alpaca agility course
Alpaca agility course
Alpaca agility course
We have designed a see-saw with enough rigidity to ask our rather large llamas to use.
Llama agility training
Llama agility course
Merlin on top
Vicki designed mounting blocks, trotting poles/jumps and adopted weaving poles. This allows us to train our alpacas and llamas whilst they are doing fun things. You can see how involved they get in trying out all the pieces of apparatus.
Llama agility course
Alpaca agility course
Alpaca agility course
Its great fun for us and our alpacas to use the agility course and we hope to add it to their halter training too as a fun thing for them to do.
Spring Farm Alpacas was heavily featured in an article on alpaca walking in Sunday’s edition of The Observer on 4/4/21.
“Do you fancy taking an alpaca for a walk? Then join the queue. This is the headline from The Observer on Sunday 4th April 2021. As we come out of lockdown, we have been able to open for bookings for alpaca walking from the 12th April. Given the extended lockdowns, people have got fed up with being stuck at home. The Observer wanted to highlight alpaca walking as a means of reconnecting with nature in the great outdoors.
Here at Spring Farm Alpacas we have been offering alpaca walking for the last 6 years. Our walks are amongst wildflower meadows surrounded by wildlife. We are quite different as we offer walks entirely within the High Weald AONB. Our walks are within our farm’s 110 acre boundaries. I think it also helps that we are only a 45 minute train journey from central London (plus a short taxi ride).
Since we have reopened, we have seen a huge number of booking for alpaca walks – but still have some availability left – especially in mid week. We hope to see you soon (weather permitting)!
With the end of lockdown, have you tried meditating with alpacas?
Enjoy an exclusive wellbeing experience – meditating with alpacas. Use the calmness and connection of alpacas to promote your inner quiet and ‘being in the moment.’ Each session is led by Alarna Lloyd after an introduction to alpacas and Spring Farm by us.
The alpaca’s presence is a fun way to experience meditation. These spiritual animals are a perfect accompaniment for the first timer or the practised meditator, wanting to experience something unusual. Meditating in small groups alongside animals can feel more powerful and enjoyable. It’s also a good way to get used to meditating with pets or larger animals when you get home – they love it!
Meditating with alpacas
Meditating with alpacas
Meditating with alpacas
What to expect?
Ten minutes of introductory talk followed by a Q & A about the farm and alpacas with the owners, Chris or Vicki.
You will be in a field full of friendly alpacas to sit with and enjoy different guided meditations.
A chance to spend time connecting to nature, the animals and each other.
Feedback from previous sessions:
“So relaxing, wonderful to spend time with the animals and combine with being in the moment which they do so well.”
“very peaceful, initially was a bit wary, but they had a very calm energy”
“easy to follow – soothing tones and background nature noise”
We are very conscious of the issues caused by COVID 19. Alarna has conducted a full on-site risk assessment for guests joining us. However, the introduction and entire visit is conducted in the open. Social distancing can be observed at all times whilst you are with us. If you need to use the toilet facilities, they are sanitised with a barrier viricide (Steri-7) prior to your arrival.
Spaces are limited to 5 people at the moment, this may change and we will be keeping up to date with Covid-19 government guidelines. The T & C’s, refunds and risk assesment are on Alarna’s website. Please check these out before booking.
For more details and for all bookings please see Alarna’s website, link below:
The last year has been exceptional in many ways – none good that I can think of! Hopefully we will be able to say goodbye to lockdowns, tier systems and fear in the future. The good news is that alpaca walking is to resume from 12/4/21!
When COVID first hit, no one knew it would be this long until a semblance of normality would return. Here at Spring Farm Alpacas, have taken the opportunity to hopefully make things better for the future. Vicki has managed to get way ahead of normal with halter training our baby alpacas. We have also done loads of fencing work and added chalk to a number of gateways. This is to reduce the mud that can build up and make progress slippery for our walkers.
Alpaca agility training
Visit Sussex and walk with our friendly halter trained alpacas on our own land
Our farm sign
We have painted the outside of our house and our holiday let. Amazingly, we have even managed to get to grips with the garden (to an extent). On the wildlife front, we have put up many more bird boxes. To aid our bees, we have planted additional wild flowers to support them.
As an alpaca breeder we have said goodbye to a number of our breeding stock. But, we are in the process of adding some new faces to our stud male group – watch this space! It will also be a big year as far as baby alpacas (cria) are concerned. We are expecting about 30 cria this year – starting in about 8 weeks. So a very exciting time ahead.
30 cria due
Can’t wait
The perfect relationship
We have had to cancel a lot of walks during 2020/21 owing to lockdown restrictions. When we do cancel alpaca walks, we typically send out vouchers (undated) so our guests can rebook when we are able to offer walks again. We are very mindful that this means that we will have a large number of guests hoping to re-book or book walks this year. Our walking team is 30 strong so that shouldn’t be an issue. But in order not to disappoint guests looking to book, we have decided to increase the maximum of walking alpacas to 12 from 10 on each walk. To keep things as personal as before, we will therefore aim to have three of us on every walk so the ratio of us to guests will actually increase!
Wide open wildflower meadows
We’re allowed out again
Alpaca walking
We really can’t wait for our alpaca walking to resume from the 12th of April. Just please be aware that bookings are starting to mount up for both walks and the holiday let.
After yesterdays Government announcement, we are going to reopen our alpaca walking diary for bookings and our holiday let both from the 12th April 2021 – hooray!
It has been a long few months with no guests but needless to say, we have been busy. We have been doing farm maintenance and halter training for the class of 2020 has started. By the 12th of April, we hope to be well ahead on our halter training and hopefully the wildflower meadows should look pristine.
Last year on the 12th April, the wild bluebells in our ancient woodlands were in full bloom and we were only 13 days away from our first baby alpaca birth. For 2021, we are expecting over 30 baby alpacas and llamas.
Here at Spring Farm Alpacas we have to think of the safety of you, our guests, and our staff. We have to cancel all our walks whilst under National Lockdown. We realise this will be very upsetting for anyone who has booked a walk over that period. However, we have to think about safety first and adhere to the Government guidelines.
We will be constantly monitoring the situation with regards to future walks. Since the last lockdown we have been very serious about your safety when you visit us and have in place stringent COVID protocols. When we are able to reopen you can be sure that we will continue to do everything to ensure that visiting Spring Farm is as safe as it can possibly be.
If you have booked a walk in the period up to the end of February, we have sent you an email with an eVoucher so you can rebook when “things get back to normal” subject to availability. Please be aware that we don’t date our vouchers. So as long as we are here – they are valid.
You may be concerned about the welfare of our walking alpacas but you can rest assured that we will continue to look after them all with our usual care and attention. We aim to use this time (without being able to offer walks) to good end. We will finish the halter training of the 2019 born crias (baby alpacas) so the walking team may well see new entrants! We had 21 new babies during 2020 so will spend a lot of time looking after the babies (and their mums). You can follow us and what we are up to on our Instagram page: springfarmalpacas
These are difficult times for us all but you can rest assured your health is paramount to us. We will keep the diary open for future bookings after the end of March 2021. To be frank, we have no idea as to when we will be able to reopen, but think that’s a reasonable guess at present. If restrictions continue to be applied to us from the end of February, we will continue on the same basis and issue undated credit vouchers. We will update our websites and social media pages as soon as we get the green light to open again.
Once again, we are very sorry to have to do this as we know that alpaca walking is great fun but we have to think of your welfare first and foremost.
Stay safe and well, and hope to see you soon!
Vicki and Chris Agar, Spring Farm Alpacas and Alpaca Walking.
After a month of Lockdown we have been given the green light to reopen for our amazing alpaca walks from Friday the 4th December. The last month has been very hard on rural businesses. So we have taken the time to catch up on fencing and other farm maintenance. We never stop!
Senor Snoopy in his new field
Loving life!
New field
The alpacas have been loving life as they get to go into the hay fields for the Winter. We have continued with the halter training of the class of 2019, and the walking team of alpacas are wondering when the carrots will resume!
So please feel free to book an alpaca walk now! Or, if you are looking for a present for Christmas – why not treat a loved one to an alpaca walking voucher! We go to the furthest lengths to make visiting us a safe experience and have full COVID protocols in place. Come and meet us and our amazing alpacas soon!
Here at Spring Farm Alpacas we have to think of the safety of you, our guests, and our staff. We have taken the difficult decision to cancel all alpaca walking during this additional lockdown period – from Thursday 5th November until the 2nd December. We realise this will be very upsetting for anyone who has booked a walk over that period. However, we have to think about safety first.
We will be constantly monitoring the situation with regards to future walks. Since the last lockdown we have been very serious about your safety when you visit us and have in place stringent COVID protocols. When we are able to reopen you can be sure that we will continue to do everything to ensure that visiting Spring Farm is as safe as it can possibly be.
If you have booked a walk in the period up to the 2nd of December, we will be emailing you in the next day or so with further details and with a voucher attached so you can rebook when “things get back to normal” subject to availability. Please be aware that we don’t date our vouchers. So as long as we are here – they are valid.
You may be concerned about the welfare of our walking alpacas but you can rest assured that we will continue to look after them all with our usual care and attention. We aim to use this time (without being able to offer walks) to good end. We will finish the halter training of the 2019 born crias (baby alpacas) so the walking team may well see new entrants! We have had 21 new babies during 2020 so will spend a lot of time looking after the babies (and their mums). You can follow us and what we are up to on our Instagram page: springfarmalpacas
These are difficult times for us all but you can rest assured your health is paramount to us. We will keep the diary open for future bookings after the 2nd of December 2020 but keep an open mind as to how we proceed from here. In the event of continuing restrictions after the 2nd December, we will continue on the same basis and issue undated credit vouchers.
Once again, we are very sorry to have to do this as we know that alpaca walking is great fun but we have to think of your welfare first and foremost.
Stay safe and well,
Vicki and Chris Agar, Spring Farm Alpacas and Alpaca Walking.
