How is crossbreeding addressed in the breed standard?
In the first section of the breed standard, ‘Phenotype of the Suri Alpaca’, the last sentence states the following. ‘The Suri alpaca phenotype is produced by the breeding of a Suri alpaca male with a Suri alpaca female.’ Perhaps some further discussion might help in explaining what is meant by this statement. It is very important that breeders fully understand the intent. In its most basic form this means that the standard is met if one breeds two alpacas that look like Suris and are registered with ARI as Suris. Another way of stating this is that both the sire and dam should have a Suri phenotype. The Suri Network document goes on to says that “There is nothing here that implied that either alpaca need to be a homozygous Suri as this a based on phenotype not genotype”. Geneticists define phenotype as: An organism’s expressed physical traits, and genotype as: The genetic makeup of an organism.The Q & A makes clear that the suri breed standard is concerned about phenotype not genotype.
