The vicuña (pronounced ve-coon-ah) is a species native to the Andes mountain, carefully associated to the guanaco. The vicuña is part of the camel family, 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. Domestic 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 fact, most vicuñas are found between 10,000 and 15,000 ft – higher than most mountains in many parts of the world. They spend their days feeding all through the grassy plains. At evening, the herds move back into the hills.
In the hills and mountainous regions, vicuñas are able to avoid lots of their predators. They are very nimble alongside rocky ridges, allowing them to evade less agile predators. Nevertheless, pumas are a major predator of vicuñas, and pumas are more than capable of capturing prey amongst not sure footing.
Vicuña Wool – One of many World’s Most Expensive Materials!
The fiber produced by the vicuña is extremely valuable because of its extraordinarily soft and warm nature. Individual wool fibers are a number of the finest within the animal kingdom – leading to one of many softest fabrics in creation when it is weaved together. The fabric is so costly that a suit jacket made of vicuña wool can price upwards of $20,000!
The fibers are designed to keep the animal comfortable within the highly variable setting of the Andes Mountains. In the day, temperatures might be scorching hot. The light color and airiness of vicuña wool make sure that the animals don’t overheat. Nighttime in the Andes is a different story, with temperatures usually dropping under 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 historic 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 well-likedity. By centuries of unregulated harvesting, the vicuña was practically extinct in the Sixties!
Interesting Insights from the Vicuña!
The vicuña is a fascinating species because of its wonderful adaptations, and in part because of the history humanity has experienced with the vicuña. While these are fascinating topics, the vicuña also displays a number of important ideas which are essential to all of biology!
Preventing Poaching – Shave the Vicuñas!
The conservation of vicuñas depends on a trick that can be useful to many different endangered species. Within the 1970s, 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 Sixties, populations are now well above 350,000! Conservationists working on other species have started adopting this technique, with related success. Rhinos and elephants in certain parks have their ivory tusks often shaved down, making the animals almost worthless to a poacher. Typically, if the valuable part of an animal may be removed without harm to the animal the strategy is ideal for reducing poaching.
Wool-Producing Animals
Quite a lot of animals produces wool – from sheep to llamas – but not all wool is the same. Wool from totally different species can have many different qualities, including its width, size, growth time, and ability to trap air pockets. Vicuña wool is extremely fine and traps air wonderfully – but can take as much as 2 years or more to develop out fully!
Most wool-producing animals advanced in environments with extreme temperature shifts. Wool traps heat when it is just too cold and dissipates heat when things start getting too hot. This allows wool-producing animals to live in mountainous environments which have drastic temperature swings regularly. Wool can also be covered in oils, which help keep animals dry when it rains heavily.
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