Great news! We weighted Pluto again today, on the basis that he has been on the goat milk replacer for almost a week now and wonderfully, he was 9.6kg which means a weight gain of 0.7kg in 4 days. This gives a daily rate of a whopping 175g which is well over twice the daily gain of the previous 4 days and equates to a potential weekly gain of 1.225kg!!! His 'actual' weight gain over the last week has been 1kg. As a comparison, Mars put on 1.4kg this last week – he of course is older by 10 days and is getting his mother's milk so it is to be expected that his figure would be higher.
We know Pluto is looking good, he has great energy levels and he is now drinking anything from 1300ml to 1575ml of milk a day, but, to have such a great figure for his weight gain as well is perfect!!! We are sure that the bond he has with Mercury in particular and with the other alpacas in general must be helping. It is utterly delightful to see him and Mars play. Last year when Mercury was their age, we often commented how lovely it would be if she had a playmate of her own kind. Bless her, she had to make do with the sheep instead!! And not all of them welcomed her advances...