Having first seen Alpacas at the Royal Show in 2001, we thought that some of these fascinating creatures would be ideal to keep the grass in check and, at the same time, look rather attractive in the paddocks.

In 2002, we decided to take the plunge and buy some. So, not wanting to over do things, we bought three boys through Michael Coghlan of Blenheim Alpacas, a Black, a White and a Brown.

We received a lot of assistance from Peter and Maxine Watts of Fine Alpacas with shearing and general husbandry. It was, in part, due to their infectious enthusiasm that we decided that it would be nice to have a few girls so that we could have cria gambolling in the paddocks. Three girls were duly purchased at auction and we became hooked!

We now have around eighty Huacayas and and a small number of Suris. We currently have seven working studs (available for outside matings), Wellground Imber (solid white), Snowshill Peregrin (basically white but, with an inconvenient brown spot! otherwise perfect and he has a fabulous fleece with a micron of 20.9, a curvature of 52.1 degrees and only 1.4% > 30 microns for his 4th fleece, as well as having a very low SD and CV), Blackmore Vale Shaston Prince (light fawn with a fantastic first fleece with a mean micron of only 16.14 and only 0.5% >=30 microns, his 5th (2010)fleece has a micron of 19.2, a curvature of 46.2 deg/mm and only 0.8% > 30 microns (all of his cria have had superb fleeces with his best, to date, having a fleece of 14.6 microns and close to 60 degrees of curvature)), Snowshill Raphael, our brown suri boy, and a magnificent multi championship winning Australian bred black stud male, Viracocha Prophecy of Anzac (co-owned with Anzac Alpacas), who has an extremely fine fleece and excellent conformation. In 2009, Snowshill Shadow Dancer joined our list of herd sires. Shadow Dancer is a dark fawn with superb conformation, a lovely short desirable head type, a well crimped and soft handling fleece and has been placed at every show entered. We also have an interesting "Apaloosa" style Stud, Snowshill Picasso, who has perfect conformation as well as a very soft handling, crimpy and dense fleece. We have another two males (a brown and a grey)that we expect to start working (in-house)later this year and a share in Wyona's Ovation of Ashcroft(a stunning Grey imported from Australia), Grand River Holyfield of Dreamcoat (a Blue Black Male imported from the United States) and Marcello of Grand River of Dreamcoat(a lovely Dark Fawn Male, also imported from the United States). In addition to these stud males, we have a number of superb home bred boys that are now working. For more information, please click on "stud services" or, give us a call regarding those not on the stud page.

Snowshill Alpacas has progressed from a hobby to a business. We have gained a considerable knowledge on all aspects of caring for, breeding and showing alpacas. We are now breeding many show winning alpacas with exceptional conformation and fleece characteristics. We are very happy to assist new and existing owners whenever possible and, if we should not be able to assist, we are very happy to put you in touch with other responsible breeders who can.

Snowshill Alpacas is set in 14 acres of the North Cotswold countryside at a little under 900 feet above sea level. Five years ago we added a purpose built Alpaca barn (by Browns of Wem) to the existing Kingsland and Scotts stables and have since purchased several mobile (wheeled) field shelters built by Harvest Services in various sizes from 10 ft x 16ft to 16ft x 24ft. The perimeter of the land has been protected from badger incursion since 1st December 2009 and all practical biosecurity measures are undertaken.

Roger is on the Heart of England Alpaca Group Committee, a member of the Southwest Alpaca Group (SWAG) and current Chairman of the West Shires Alpaca Group.