LLama Tails
Last update - January 8, 2010
I'm sure Tracy won't mind my sharing her heart warming tales of adventure
in the mountains of Colorado, since word of this search has already made
national news. I'm very proud of my little sister, her friends and her llama,
Autumn Dancer. I know after reading this story you will be too.
There have been a few sightings of the baby llama near the tracks, but no one has been able
to capture him - except on film.
~ Tracy duCharme - September 29, 2009
As many of you know, we are trying to find and rescue a lost little llama on the top of Pike's Peak. Marlice Van Zandt, Michael Shealy and I went up the mountain yesterday with their dear old llama Moon Shadow. We went up to the peak in their van on Monday, as soon as the road was cleared of snow, and hiked down a couple of miles to where the llama was last seen on Sunday night.
Unfortunately, there are hunters up there just now going after the sheep. The llama has been seen hanging out with the wild sheep, and we immediately saw fresh llama footprints along the train tracks. We were very encouraged at first, but although we saw the sheep several times, we never spotted our guy.
It was a beautiful day, and the snow is rapidly receding up there. There is plenty of fresh water all around, and still an abundance of forage, even up as high as we were. We know he survived the storm, so we are hopeful that we can find him. It just may take a few tries! Hiking down along the tracks was a breeze.
Hiking back up, on the other hand...not so much!!! I haven't gone uphill on a mountain at 14,000 ft without a chairlift very often!
The sheep are hard to see (above). They are the same color as the rocks! But Moon Shadow never failed to point them out to us. As soon as we hear of another sighting, we'll head back up to the peak.
Keep your fingers crossed! I'll send an update after our next ascent.
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~ Tracy duCharme - October 2, 2009
Well, We went back up to the top of Pikes Peak today in search of the lost little llama. It was very cold up there today. It was extremely windy and the wind chill the rangers had posted was -2 degrees. I went with Mike Shealy and Kathy Wallace. Mike brought his llama Shasta, and I brought Autumn Dancer with me.
Dancer posed for the tourists on the train.
A gazette reporter, and a TV news reporter from channel 11 came along for the ride. We walked along the cog rail tracks for about .5 mile, and then Mike and Shasta kept going down the hill while the rest of us turned to go back up to the summit. We had almost given up when I spotted him about a mile off the train tracks.
Dancer and I walked down the tundra towards him until he spotted us.
And he came running!
When he reached us I realized that he was just a baby. The halter I had brought along was just way too big on him, so I had to slip it down around his neck. He almost immediately tried to nurse, which Dancer (a gelding) wasn't having any part of!!!
That's the spot in the background of the picture (above) where he was resting and playing when we found him. He followed Dancer right along. The only problem was that every time I stopped to catch my breath, he would try to nurse, and Dancer was good and sick of him by the time we reached the truck.
Good boy that Dancer is, he let the baby snuggle with him for the long ride down the mountain. At least when you're kushed there is none of that nursing nonsense!
He was happy to say hello to my llamas over the fence.
The sad news is that his ears are extremely frost bitten. I think they will fall off. He is the sweetest little thing. Not afraid of us, and so happy to be around llamas again. He is a little thin, but not dangerously so. He was out there on his own for at least a month, so I doubt if he was weaned before he was separated from his Dam. He has lots of nice silky white fiber. Even if he loses his beautiful ears, he is still a brave, playful little soul that will be a blessing to his herd.It feels great to have him safe in the barn tonight!
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~ Tracy duCharme - October 3, 2009
The story was picked up by the Associated Press and has gone national. The phone has been ringing off the hook all day. It's crazy! Check out this shot my friend took up near the summit.
I took him to the vet today, and she thinks he will keep his ears. I am so happy, his ears are darling. She said he is amazingly healthy, and probably only 7 months old. Poor baby! He is so sweet, great temperament, and nice confirmation. Mystery how a baby got way up there!
I still can't believe I got him. I am very proud of Dancer, because this was the hardest thing I've ever asked him to do. It was bitter cold, and the terrain was downright scary at times.
I love happy endings. Pikes Peak's Homer is quite the little celebrity.
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~ Tracy duCharme - October 5, 2009
The most amazing thing has happened! We found Homer's family. The news story went National, and the owners heard about it while in Seattle!
We have learned that Homer lived on a ranch on the South face of Pikes Peak, about 3 miles from the summit. On August 15th, a mountain lion killed his mother. The ranch owners found the carcass of the mother, and feared the worst for Homer. They looked for him, or his remains for days with no luck. They never knew about the loose white llama on the mountain until they saw in the news that he had been captured! I spoke to her today and she is so grateful and amazed that he is alive and well. She said she used to choke up every time she looked at his fleece, thinking that he was dead.
She has asked me to board him for a while until she can decide what to do. She is uneasy about keeping llamas on her place now. This was their second llama lost to lions.
He is just the sweetest little thing!
Homer's first day at our ranch. I placed him in a pen in the pasture, and Emilio walked over and kushed next to the panels. He sat there for a couple of hours just quietly watching the baby.
Tracy
Tracy duCharme
Idle Hour Ranch
Colorado Springs, CO
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One of the reporters brought a professional photographer out to my place to get pix of Homer. He posted some on his website... they're wonderful. With his permission, here is the link:
http://www.erickdanzer.com/lonely-llama/
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Rescuers capture 'Homer' the lonely llama on Pikes Peak
THE GAZETTE
The “lone llama of Pikes Peak,” the baby llama that survived a month on Pikes Peak’s chilly windswept slopes, is now safe and warm.
The llama was captured Friday afternoon after a busy month — it frequently amused riders on the Pikes Peak Cog Railway, running close to the train, but also alarmed llama owners around the nation, who worried it would become food for a mountain lion or die from the cold.
The male llama is thin and may lose its ears to frostbite but is otherwise fine, said rescuer Tracy Ducharme, a llama owner from Black Forest. And the lone llama even has a name now.
“I dubbed him ‘Homer’ because of his little odyssey. And he’s going home,” she said.
Actually, no one knows where “home” is for the 6-month-old llama. It was first spotted Sept. 3 by passengers on the Cog, and has since been roaming the peak’s south slope, living off alpine vegetation and trying unsuccessfully to make friends with a herd of bighorn sheep.
Llamas are native to the Andes Mountains of South America, and are often kept as livestock or pets here. Officials don’t know how the llama got on the 14,115-foot mountain, but nobody has come forward to claim it.
Despite its long time on the lam — eluding capture on at least one occasion, when some Cog employees and a Pikes Peak Highway ranger tried to rope it — capturing it Friday proved relatively easy.
Ducharme and another llama owner, Mike Shealy, also of Black Forest, brought two llamas to the summit and walked down the railroad tracks, hoping the loose llama’s herd instincts would send it running. They tried that approach last weekend but never saw the llama.
They split up and, early in the afternoon, Ducharme saw the white llama in the distance, about a half-mile below the summit on the south side of the peak, playing and enjoying a sunny but brutally windy day on the mountain.
“He was just being a baby and running around down there and thinking about coming to see us,” she said.
The llama ran across the rocky tundra and nuzzled her llama Dancer, seemingly thrilled to finally have some company. Then it tried to nurse from Dancer.
Dancer, a male, was not thrilled with the idea.
Ducharme simply slipped a rope around its neck, then a harness, and the llama’s adventure was over. It trudged with little protest up to a waiting trailer.
“I am so happy. I am going to do an e-mail blast and tell everyone, ‘We got him!’” she said.
Unfortunately for Shealy, he was out of cell phone range and proceeded with his plan to walk the entire length of the tracks, looking for the llama. Late in the afternoon, the Cog sent a train with a flat-bed car up for his llama, Shasta, which was either injured or refused to keep walking. Details were sketchy Friday afternoon.
Ducharme plans to keep the lone llama on her farm for now, then find it a permanent home. Such has been the concern from llama owners all over, she doubts she will have any trouble.
“They’re just intelligent. They’re really easy to keep. They’re full of personality,” she said. “People that are dog lovers, if they heard about a dog in trouble, they’d want to help him.”
“We’re llama lovers and I think it would be hard for him to survive on his own.”
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Llama ran away when mother was killed by mountain lion
October 04, 2009 8:11 PM
THE GAZETTE
The mystery behind a baby llama roaming the rocky slopes of Pikes Peak for more than a month has now been solved.
The little llama, dubbed Pikes Peak’s Homer by his temporary caretaker Tracy Ducharme, was traumatized and ran off on Aug. 14 when his mom was killed by a mountain lion. His owner, Theresa Kabot, told Ducharme that they searched the ranch, at the southern foot of Pikes Peak, but figured he had been killed as well when they didn’t find him.
Instead, the little guy was hanging out on Pikes Peak, where he charmed passengers on the cog railway and tried unsuccessfully to make friends with a herd of bighorn sheep. When Ducharme, a llama owner from Black Forest, heard his story she headed up the mountain Friday to rescue him. She brought her llama along, and Homer immediately ran up to them.
Homer’s rescue story traveled even farther than he did. He got so much media attention that the story traveled by The Associated Press to Seattle, where Kabot is staying for business. She called Ducharme as soon as she found out.
“They just sounded overjoyed that he’s safe,” Ducharme said. “They thought he was dead.”
Kabot sent Ducharme a picture of Homer and his mother, and sure enough, it was him. Ducharme will watch the llama while Kabot stays in Seattle for the next few weeks.
In the meantime, Ducharme is trying to help him gain weight and had him examined by a veterinarian.
“The backs of his ears were frostbitten,and he probably won’t have hair on his ears, but he’s doing great besides that,” she said. “The vet said that any other kind of creature that would have been lost up there would have succumbed, but being native to alpine areas, he weathered it really well.”
She said she couldn’t sleep Saturday because she was so excited that she found his owners. She said llamas bond closely to their herd and he will be excited to be back with his.
“He’s had such a traumatic time, it feels great to have him so safe and happy,” she said. “It really feels like he’s home safe now.”
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Marlice and I took Homer the llama up to Denver and into a news studio for a couple of interviews during the National Western Stock Show. He was such a good boy! I joked with Marlice that none of my "trained" llamas would have stood so still or tolerated a strange woman stroking there back so well!!
If you are interested, here are the links to the 2 news stories. We don't know why they labeled Marlice "Homer's owner," but other than that, it was pretty good.
Tracy and Marlice
http://www.kdvr.com/videobeta/?watchId=a7a2d4c1-92ae-4921-a236-406badbab837
http://www.2thedeuce.com/videobeta/watch/?watch=d3cab6eb-6176-48ae-bf12-be3a90a54bee&src=front
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The Llama Welfare Foundation
Dedicated to the Love and Lives of Llamas
A Brave Little Llama Inspires Us All
In the fall of 2009, an orphaned llama embarked on a journey to save his life. Armed with nothing more than a soft white coat of silky fiber and a plucky spirit, this little guy ran from predators and climbed Pike’s Peak looking for safety and company.
Following wild sheep, grazing on sparse forage, approaching tourists on the cog rail train, his search for protection became a race against time as the deadly storms of winter began to build on the mountain. The first snows covered what little food Homer could find on the rocky slopes, yet still he clung to the harsh terrain rather than risk the dangers he had faced below. The humans who had been spotting him began to worry. He had no shelter, vanishing food, and no skills for wilderness survival. He was a young, vulnerable herd animal without a herd. After over a month on his own, word of his plight began to find its way to the ears of llama lovers in the valley.
A daring rescue effort was launched. Teams of humans and llamas attempted to scale the mountain, being turned back several times by deep snows, blizzards and below zero temperatures. Citings of Homer ceased. Hope was running out. Then nature offered a brief break between storms and rescue attempts resumed. On a day of -40° wind chill, a team of three people and two llamas scrambled up impossibly steep slopes, through deep snows and over icy rocks. One of the llamas collapsed from exhaustion. Searchers were on the edge of accepting defeat. The second llama, Autumn Dancer and his human, Tracy duCharme paused to scan the barren landscape one last time, trying to imagine where in that unforgiving land a young llama might be.
They spotted a tiny white speck among the rocks in an area where the snow had blown clear and a little grass was visible. As they stared, the white speck stood up and began to jump, romp and play by himself in that cold, lonely place. Homer had been found. The rescue pair made their way downhill. Very soon, Homer saw what he had been seeking: one of his own kind. He raced to Autumn Dancer, immediately snuggling up under the chin of the older llama. His solitary journey was happily over.
Countless Other Llamas in Need of Rescue
The real life story of Homer’s llama odyssey found its way into the hearts of animal lovers everywhere. The day of his rescue was captured on tape by a local television news crew. The pictures and story were picked up and published in newspapers across the country and by Internet around the world. We were all inspired by Homer’s courage and the happy ending of his adventure.
Not many llamas in the United States find themselves in Homer’s frightening predicament. Unfortunately, many more face even greater dangers every day—dangers from which they cannot escape—such as abuse, neglect, and abandonment by owners who can no longer care for them or have simply lost interest in the animals depending on them for care.
Help Is on its Way
Individuals and llama rescue groups have stepped up to begin addressing the problem through adoption and education, but the need is already outpacing available resources. The nonprofit Llama Welfare Foundation has now been established to help make sure those independent efforts succeed. The Foundation sponsors an annual national Llama Welfare Award with a cash gift that honors individuals who regularly and generously help llamas in need. Its development plan includes specialized training for the rehabilitation and rehoming of abused and homeless llamas; offering grants to existing llama rescue endeavors; providing guidance and development assistance to those organizations; and offering broad-based education to llama breeders and owners in the realm of long term responsibility for the viability, respect and lifelong care of llamas.
Homer’s Odyssey to Help Other Llamas
As with all bold efforts to change the world into a more loving, caring place, The Llama Welfare Foundation requires financial assistance to reach its goals. Like the courageous little llama Homer, this fledgling organization is bravely scaling the steep climb to success by raising funds that will go directly toward hands on efforts to care for llamas in need and toward education that will protect them.
One path leading to the realization of this dream is the current book length project relating Homer’s story in fictional form, being written by Foundation founder and author Gayle Woodsum, and illustrated by Homer’s human rescuer and artist, Tracy duCharme. Upon publication of the work, profits will be used to help fund the Llama Welfare Foundation.
Become Part of the Happy Ending Dream
You can keep Homer’s happy ending alive and become part of making an even bigger dream come true. Stay in touch with the Llama Welfare Foundation as it grows, and keep track of Homer as he settles into life as a celebrity and member of his new herd. Get updates on the book project. More information and a full prospective on the Foundation development plan is available from founder Gayle Woodsum of Laramie, Wyoming. She can be reached at LlamaWelfare@aol.com or 307.399.3815. The Foundation’s web site is on its way, with its address also available through Gayle. Donations to this work will be gratefully accepted.
About the Logo
The Llama Welfare Foundation logo was created by artist Tracy duCharme of Colorado before she ever spotted Homer in the shadow of the Pike’s Peak summit. She says: “The inspiration for the logo comes from the idea of mutual benefit that I feel is a part of our relationship with these wonderful animals. It is hard for people to spend any time with llamas without falling in love! People always ask me what I use the llamas for, and although we do ‘use’ them for wool, packing and fertilizer; in our family they really are companions. That is the feeling that I wanted to portray for an organization that has been created for the benefit of the most needy of our llama friends."
The Llama Welfare Foundation • P.O. Box 536 • Laramie, WY 82073 • LlamaWelfare@aol.com
