For alpaca fans, shearing day a time of fun

Fold by fold, the buzzing shears whittled away Sharif’s dark winter coat.

The 6-year-old alpaca occasionally bleated, but he soon emerged thinner, his hair a sleek black rather than the brownish fluff that had covered him just moments earlier.

“You get to see the true alpaca,” said Sharif’s owner, Mary Lane of Mullins.

Tuesday was shearing day at Sunny Skies Alpaca, a small farm about 6 miles outside of Loris. The annual spring event is where the farm’s animals and a few visiting alpacas, like Lane’s, are shorn for the summer.

For Debbie and George Myers, the day also serves as a reminder of why they wanted to retire. Before they moved to 8 acres off S.C. 9, the couple lived in West Virginia. She worked for a cell phone company and he was an HVAC mechanic at a plant.

Retirement brought questions.

“We even thought that we were going to size down and just travel in a camper,” Debbie Myers said. “I did not like the idea of getting up and just wandering every morning. I’m a person that needs a job and he is, too.”

Indigenous to South America, alpacas are part of the camel family, though they don’t have humps. The animals have been domesticated for thousands of years and their wooly coats — called fiber — are soft.

Debbie Myers first saw alpacas on television years ago, met a few once at a bed and breakfast, and gradually became fascinated with the furry animals that chew their feed with a side-to-side grind.

She actually got her first alpacas before she even bought her property.

But of all the animals that roam farms, why alpacas?

“I’m not a horse person,” she said. “I’d already seen these guys.”

Sunny Skies holds 15 alpacas with names like Brandi, Anna, Tiffany and Alex.

“They all have names,” Debbie Myers said.

Her alpacas have fans and small swimming pools to stay cool the summer. She’s raised some from birth. Some she bottle fed. All get their shots, dental work, toenail trimming, twice daily feedings and plenty of affection.

But the animals aren’t simply for show.

Once the alpacas are sheared, Debbie Myers sorts the blankets of fiber and grades it. Then there’s plenty of spinning and coloring.

The finest fiber will be used for lightly used items, such as baby blankets or chemo hats. Stronger material will be used for socks, shawls, scarves and other accessories.

She often sells her wares at Myrtle’s Market and attends fiber shows, though she’s been working on improving her website.

“I’m starting to branch out a little bit more,” she said.

As the afternoon wore on, the alpacas received their annual haircut. Amid the hum of the shears and the scent of sweet hay and manure, the alpaca farmers reflected on what drew them to the furry characters.

“You don’t just go down the road and see an alpaca,” Lane said. “When you have alpacas in the field, that’s when you see the cars slow down. They’re a wonderful conversation piece.”

And when it comes to alpaca allegiance, it’s a steadfast love.

“There’s no undoing it,” Lane said. “They steal your heart.”

This story was originally published March 22, 2016 at 9:29 PM with the headline "For alpaca fans, shearing day a time of fun."