By Cecilia Nasmith/Northumberland 89.7 FM/Today’s Northumberland
In only its second year of including alpacas in the mix, the Royal Agricultural Winter Fair has – so far – awarded ribbons in 2023 and 2024 to a local farm, Rice Lake Alpacas.
In fact, the Hamilton Township alpaca farm has collected at least one ribbon or award for every alpaca they have exhibited to date – two for the alpaca they brought in 2023, and five for the four alpacas they brought this year.
Set on a beautiful, hilly tract of land overlooking Rice Lake that Ciane Hynes-Cox and her husband James Cox purchased eight years ago, the 40-acre property was originally supposed to be a horse-boarding operation.
Hynes-Cox, a Grafton-born-and-raised girl, grew up with horses and loved the idea of seeing them roam her land. They built their house, set up the fencing – and then stood by as everyone went into a pandemic.
Christmas 2020 came, and Hynes-Cox was determined to shop local as she considered presents of alpaca socks or toques for her husband’s best friend and his wife, who live in Thunder Bay are are extreme outdoor adventurers.
“I knew enough about alpaca fleece to know it’s warmth, and it would be a perfect gift that’s small enough to mail,” she recalled in a recent interview.
“The more I started to research where you could buy the product, and the animals…I said to my husband, ‘We need some of these. This is the perfect property, with these hillsides – they come from the Andes Mountains and they would love it here.’”
Her husband knew nothing about alpacas. She showed him a picture, and he said they looked like something out of Dr. Seuss.
Nevertheless, they got their first five in July 2021. Now Rice Lake Alpacas is home to 16.
“They are very interesting animals – calming, therapeutic,” she said.
“You want to just go and watch them. They are curious, stand-offish, and they communicate in a soft kind of hum like dolphins or whales underwater.
“It’s just very quiet and serene. We’ve got some benches and seating areas around the property. You can just go and take a book.”
Visitors remark on the peacefulness and serenity of their time there, and often tell her, “Thank you for sharing your joy.”
They were thrilled to be invited to show at the Royal Agricultural Winter Fair when (in their 101st year) they began accepting alpacas in 2023. They found about 50 alpacas competing in the halter show, with classes set (as with most animals) for their age, their gender and their colour.
They chose carefully which of their alpacas to take, and chose seven-year-old Vegas.
“He took a first-place ribbon, and I was beyond elated,” Hynes-Cox recalled.
“He was an older male, but we felt the best of our herd, and his personality is just to die for.”
There was more good news – Vegas also won a silver medal for the entire event.
“Out of close to 50 animals, he was the runner-up,” she explained.
“But he was competing against a two-year-old, and the fleece on them is much softer when they’re younger.”
This year’s fair saw Rice Lake Alpacas take Vegas back. Though he is now about three years older than the age one might typically enter, she said, they still consider him magnificent.
Vegas was accompanied by a one-year-old male named Conan, a one-year-old female named Tippa and a two-year-old female named Jillian (who happened to be the farm’s first cria the term for a newborn alpaca).
And every one of them won first- or second-place award. Vegas, in fact, got two awards – first place in his class and a reserve championship.
With competition over for the year, Hynes-Cox is looking forward to gathering her alpaca yarn and other products to participate in her first Christmas Market, the one hosted by Viking Nursery Nov. 30 and Dec. 1.
And after that, she looks forward to promoting her wares more actively by hosting events at Rice Lake Alpacas, such as workshops and – perhaps next year – even her own Christmas Market.
