Ringo needs little introduction - with 23 Championships and 2 Judges' Choice Awards his quality is indisputable! At 8 months old, Ringo wowed the judge at his first show, the Southern Select in Tennessee. He came in 1st in his class of 14, and went on to win Reserve Championship. That trend continued on for 3 years, winning championships in 2011, 2012 and 2013 before finally retiring to a full-time breeding career. When we selected Ringo to add to our herdsire lineup, we were looking for: -- Superior fleece                             -- Great EPDs -- Great conformation                       -- Grey genetics -- Proven, champion offspring           -- Great personality Ringo brings every one of those aspects to the table. Ringo has shiny, crimpy, dense fleece from nose to toes, and he has the "look at me" presence that sets him apart. Along with his fine, dense fleece, you get great staple length and architecture with high frequency, high amplitude crimp. Then to top it off he has a beautiful head and great proportion and style...and he has a great personality to match! A strong breeder with plenty of "macho" yet he can be put in with young boys and gets along with the other older guys as well. An early histogram for Ringo gave the following in 2009: 16.9 AFD, 4.1 SD, 100% CF. Six plus years later, he posted the following in 2016: 22.9 AFD, 4.9 SD, 91.4% CF and a curvature of 70! Great numbers for a male who already had ~65 cria on the ground! During his show career, he was instrumental in helping his silver grey sire, Orlando Cloud (one of the elite grey males with enormous impact on the grey huacaya breeding world), win Herdsire of the Year at MAPACA in 2013 & 2014 with his back-to-back championships in fawn at those shows. However, none of his accomplishments matter unless he can pass on his excellence! Not only does he post great numbers himself, have a look at his 2017 EPDs! He is solid across the board in expected progeny improvement. To say that Championships run in his blood is an understatement. Check out his relatives: Ringo has produced multiple Champion offspring (24 banners so far) and ribbon winners galore (175+ ribbons so far, including 72 blues) in a variety of colors! Epic Alpacas proudly co-owns Ringo Cloud with Asgard Acres and Alpacas of the Alleghenies.

First, you have to thank Red Granite for delivering such an outstanding male. Second, you have to thank Kitt Hollister for selling you her herd, including this outstanding male, and if I could reduce the lack of hesitation in making that purchase, I could in fact reduce it to this one male. From Kitt: "The best way to introduce this male is using the facts. First: YES, he is a true Harlequin. His great grandsire, Black Epic, is one of the most prolific Harlequin Appaloosa producers out there. His spots are subtle as his coloring is very light, a most stunning lavender rose grey. They are there, however, and there is no question that his extraordinary coloration is the result of the Harlequin Appaloosa gene." At 127.2 follicles/square mm density, Man of Mystery is the densest alpaca yet biopsied by Ian Watt in the USA, and I have not yet heard of a denser alpaca out there. With a primary SD of 2.5, secondary SD of 2.2, and fiber population differential of 3.5, he is also one of the most uniform. To quote Ian Watt directly, "overall this is the best alpaca I have tested in the US." His yearling histogram, at 16.0 AFD and 3.1 SD, is fine. His two year old histogram, at 17.3 AFD and still a 3.1 SD, is fine. His 2019 AFD, calculated off of his biopsy, is 16.9. So, he's fine, and he's staying fine, which is to be expected. Why? Well, his sire, CCNF Legionnaire, has a 6 y/o AFD of 17.3 with an SD of 3.5, and his dam's 5 y/o histogram was 20.5 with an SD of 3.5 -- impressive for any color, but stunning for a TRUE BLACK. So, here we go: unbelievably dense, uniform, and fine. As the pictures show, this fleece is, as expected, also quite beautiful -- bright bright bright, with a high-frequency crimp that stamps it as truly elite. He also has a decent staple. So far, he has thrown pattern 80+% of the time. His crias demonstrate his unique coloring and fantastic fiber statistics! He's produced blacks with 16 micron fleeces adn 2.9 SDs, and appaloosa/harlequins with 17.9 microns and 3.6 SDs. Be on the lookout. This guy is restricted but his kids are not... Much much more to come.