Vicuna - The Basics
The vicuña (pronounced ve-coon-ah) is a species native to the Andes mountain, intently related to the guanaco. The vicuña is part of the camel household, although it is by far the smallest member. Compared to a guanaco, the vicuña is only about half the dimensions, has a smaller tail, and finer wool. Home alpacas are likely to have originated from historic vinuña domestication attempts.
Vicuñas occupy the grasslands of the central Andes mountains and are adapted to very high elevations. In actual fact, most vicuñas are found between 10,000 and 15,000 feet – higher than most mountains in lots of parts of the world. They spend their days feeding throughout the grassy plains. At evening, the herds move back into the hills.
Within the hills and mountainous regions, vicuñas are able to avoid lots of their predators. They're very nimble alongside rocky ridges, allowing them to evade less agile predators. Nevertheless, pumas are a serious predator of vicuñas, and pumas are more than capable of capturing prey among unsure footing.
Vicuña Wool – One of the World’s Most Expensive Fabrics!
The fiber produced by the vicuña is extraordinarily valuable because of its extraordinarily soft and warm nature. Particular person wool fibers are some of the finest within the animal kingdom – leading to one of many softest materials in creation when it is weaved together. The material is so costly that a suit jacket made of vicuña wool can value upwards of $20,000!
The fibers are designed to keep the animal comfortable in the highly variable surroundings of the Andes Mountains. Within the day, temperatures might be scorching hot. The light color and airiness of vicuña wool be sure that the animals don't overheat. Nighttime in the Andes is a unique story, with temperatures typically dropping beneath freezing. Hole air pockets within the wool keep the organisms warm even within the face of freezing temperatures.
Part of the reason that the vicuña was revered by historical Inca civilization was because of its fine wool. Only Incan royalty was allowed to wear the wool, as a sign of status and respect. When the Spanish conquistadors invaded South America, vicuña wool was taken back to Europe and grew in fashionableity. By way of centuries of unregulated harvesting, the vicuña was practically extinct in the Nineteen Sixties!
Fascinating Insights from the Vicuña!
The vicuña is a fascinating species because of its superb adaptations, and in part because of the history humanity has experienced with the vicuña. While these are fascinating subjects, the vicuña additionally displays a number of vital ideas which are necessary to all of biology!
Stopping Poaching – Shave the Vicuñas!
The conservation of vicuñas relies on a trick that can be helpful to many other endangered species. In the Nineteen Seventies, the Peruvian government and a number of non-profit organizations teamed up to forestall the vicuña from going extinct. To do so required the assistance of the community and a big number of wool shears.
This technique helped get the vicuña off of the endangered species list! Although there have been as little as 6,000 vicuña within the Nineteen Sixties, populations are now well above 350,000! Conservationists working on other species have started adopting this method, with similar success. Rhinos and zodiac01 elephants in certain parks have their ivory tusks often shaved down, making the animals almost valueless to a poacher. Typically, if the valuable part of an animal may be removed without harm to the animal the tactic is perfect for reducing poaching.
Wool-Producing Animals
A wide range of animals produces wool – from sheep to llamas – however not all wool is the same. Wool from totally different species can have many different qualities, including its width, size, progress time, and ability to trap air pockets. Vicuña wool is extremely fine and traps air wonderfully – but can take up to 2 years or more to develop out absolutely!
Most wool-producing animals evolved in environments with severe temperature shifts. Wool traps heat when it is just too cold and dissipates heat when things start getting too hot. This permits wool-producing animals to live in mountainous environments which have drastic temperature swings regularly. Wool can also be covered in oils, which assist keep animals dry when it rains heavily.
