Keeping Alpacas with horses

[Lucyloo54]

Hello,

I was wondering if anyone had any advice or experience with this. I keep my mare, who is 14, at the yard of a friend, she shares the field with one other elderly mare. Both are docile and it works well.

My friend has come into ownership of an alpaca and wants to put her in the field with my mare and the other horse as she thinks it would be the best fit.

What do people think of this? Are there any issues that could arise? I don’t know much about alpacas other than they are very cute!

I don’t want to tell my friend where she can put her alpaca on her own yard but I also want to make sure my horse, and the alpaca, are comfortable

 

[Zoeypxo]

some horses can be aggressive towards alpacas, even docile ones.
My horse is generally a kind natured horse but tried to kill a sheep that entered her field.

also i think alapacas need to live with other alpacas too?

 

[Lucyloo54]

some horses can be aggressive towards alpacas, even docile ones.
My horse is generally a kind natured horse but tried to kill a sheep that entered her field.

also i think alapacas need to live with other alpacas too?

Thank you for this! I think it’s just supposed to be a temporary measure but obviously if it could be dangerous then it won’t do!

 

[tda]

My friend used to have one living with her pony, I don't think they really got on, more tolerated each other.
Pony was often covered in alpaca spit ??

 

[vhf]

We had 2 alpacas - they really shouldn't be apart from other alpacas (sheep at a push) so hopefully this is a temporary measure. One mare thought they were the work of the devil, and eventually decided the only way to deal with them was to pretend they didn't exist. She would actively look away to avoid having to acknowledge them. She could have shared a field with them but I chose not to offend her highness... Second mare thought they were the most interesting play toy ever and would follow them, chase them, try and play with them... they never got a second's peace if she was there. So we had to keep them separate. When one alpaca died, the other pined desperately even though I tried putting him with her highness for company, so we rehomed him to a small herd where he is very happy.

 

[Moobli]

I kept my Shetland ponies with the Estate owners alpacas and even wintered them in a shed together in very bad snow and they were absolutely fine. I wouldn’t say they were friends but they weren’t aggressive towards one another. Both were/are used to living with sheep too.