I am sure that as the midnight hour approached we all thought about making some resolutions for the New Year...and some of those may even have involved alpacas ..I do hope so

For those of you who aren't already members of an AOBA affiliate the start of the New Year is a great time to join.

There are AOBA Affiliates all over the USA and in some places you may well have the choice of two or even three. If not then get together with some local alpaca farms and start a new affiliate.

So what do you get out of an affiliate membership? Well it obviously varies from affiliate to affiliate but SoJAA the affiliate I support offers a range of benefits:

SoJAA Benefits of Membership
Volume Discounts
Recent bulk buys include alpaca socks, Norm Evans Field Manual (2nd edition), microchips and chip readers, feed supplements, shearing, hay and hay testing equipment, cria resuscitation kits and custom embroidered clothing.

Meetings
Regular meetings are organised throughout the year with relevant and interesting guest speakers. Either at special member only low rates or often at no additional cost. Topics such as: Inserting microchips, testing hay, showing fleeces, BVDV in alpacas, farm and ranch insurance have all been featured.

Show Time
AlpacaMania our annual AOBA Certified Alpaca Show. Is your chance to be involved in staging the friendliest alpaca show in the world.

Internet Activity
The SOJAA web site includes details of members’ farms, access to discussion forums, library of articles, a commercial forum, and member mass mailing facility. All of which combine to ensure you stay informed of industry issues and other relevant topics. Members are also able to use the SOJAA "Alpaca Marketplace" to promote animals that they have for sale or hire.

Advertising
From time to time SOJAA place advertisements in suitable publications. These ads are designed to attract Internet traffic to the SOJAA web site and then to your farm…the rest is up to you!

Fellowship
The opportunity to meet and get to know like minded alpaca breeders who value integrity and friendship but often have differing views on alpaca topics such as say breed standards. All views are welcome.

Knowledge Pool
Within the SOJAA membership, we have a wealth of talented people. People who will share their knowledge and experience on just about any subject you can think of: processing fibre, spinning yarn, alpaca husbandry, marketing, web design, barn construction, pasture maintenance, hay analysis and many more.

Industry Support
Each year SOJAA make a substantial donation to organisations associated with alpaca welfare. In 2005 for example SOJAA donated an endoscope to the Camelid Facility at Oregon State University. In 2006 SOJAA donated equipment to combat hypothermia in alpaca cria.

Veterinary Scholarships
New in 2006 were a number of scholarships. These scholarships are offered to enable young vets to attend specialist camelid courses at OSU. This initiative helps build the expertise and enthusiasm for alpacas among vets in the areas where we live.

Grants
Each year SOJAA makes available a limited number of grants to support activities that promote the alpaca industry such as Fibre on the Foot.

Charities
SOJAA supported two charities in 2006: ACCESS and Southern Oregon Humane Society.

All this for $100....that beats anything you might find in the January Sales...

www.sojaa.org

Adrian Stewart