Things in Nature that Make Me Believe in God
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Essay 2 - The Prayer of a Llama
by Peter Illyn, Director
I had an old male llama named Benny. He wasn't a gelding; he was an intact male, if you know what I mean. While the rest of the llamas had their heads to the ground eating grain, Benny would be standing at the fence line looking over the horizon dreaming about mating.
One day my daughter looked up the window and said. “Daddy our llamas are in the front yard… no wait! Those aren’t our llama's!” An abandoned herd of female llamas had been running wild in the county for the past month, I later learned from police. They stopped running, however, when they came to my farm. Benny taught me a lot about prayer because that night was the best night of his life. He was an old llama, the best packer I ever had. He didn’t live much longer after that night – but he made a baby! You go, old man!
So 360 days later, I was blessed when one of the mama llamas named Dottie gave birth to a little brown male who looked just like his daddy. Click here to continue reading about how llamas help me believe in God and learn interesting facts like "the Incan word for dried llama meat was 'jer-que,' which is where we get the term jerky." (I used to threaten my llamas that if they didn't behave, I would see they ended up next to the checkout counter at 7-11.)
Llamas have few defense skills – they are not very fast runners, they don’t have sharp hooves, fangs or claws, they are covered with soft wool. All they can really do when threatened is spit. It is rude, trust me, it only make the spit-upon angrier. Trust me, I speak from experience and confess to having cursed out a few llamas in my day. I hope God understands.
Instead of defensive mechanisms, like plating like on an armadillo, speed like a gazelle, or camouflage like a walking stick insect, God chose to give llamas and camels a special measure of providence – the ability to survive in ecosystems harsher than their predators can survive in – camels in the desert and llamas in the high mountains above tree line.
Llamas are amazingly adaptive creatures. They have elliptical blood cells, the opposite of sickle-cells found in the tropics; deeply curved and bright red, they’re able to latch on to the super thin oxygen at 14,000 feet above sea level. A llama’s blood is also bright, bright red – chock full of cells ready to grab all the oxygen they can get. As such, llamas became the perfect pack animals of the indigenous people of the Andes. They were able to travel from sea level to mountain top with ease.
I've seen llamas sitting motionless all night long, becoming completely covered in 6 inches of falling snow. Their hair is also hollow with long outer hair that sheds rain and soft inner hair that keeps them warm. But when morning comes they stand up and shake off and wait for me to finish my cup of coffee before hitting the trail. The Incas would make clothes for themselves out of the softer inner wool, and rugs and bags out of the courser outer wool. Alpaca and vicunas, two cousins of llamas, have the softest fiber in the world.
A llama also has three stomachs. It is called a ruminant, one that breaks down food in a tri-step process, including regurgitating and re-chewing its cud. This ability allows animals like llamas and deer , who are most exposed to danger when they are grazing, to go out at dawn, fill up a stomach with plant matter, and then hide in the brush and spend the rest of the day chewing what they had gathered. Stomach acid also plays a large role as everything they eat rots and breaks down. That is the sour mash a llama spits when perturbed.
This trait, however, is one of many of God’s provisions. “Even their poop don’t stink,” was one campaign ad we considered. Llamas excrete hard pellets, similar to an elk’s. Unlike a horse’s one stomach, llama dung has gone through three stomachs. This means llama dung is virtually odorless, invasive seed free and low in nitrogen and phosphorus. It is a great fertilizer and will not burn the delicate plants.
Llamas are browsers, not grazers. They eat grass but also twigs, bark, charcoal, shrubs. They can process low levels of protein and carbohydrates, as low as 1 to 2% so they can live on dry lands. They are easy to care for in the wilderness – in fact, all the world is a salad bar to a llama. They are happy to walk and graze along the trail all day long. It also means you do not have to carry much supplemental feed when traveling with a llama. You just need to give them time in the morning and evening to browse.
Llamas also have only lower front teeth. This allows them to rip the top of grass off, but prevents them from tearing the roots or pulling the plant out of the ground. This way the llamas get the nourishment of this year’s solar growth found in the plant, but keeps the roots intact for an easier grow-back. This way, llamas do not overgraze the fragile meadows of the high plains.
Llamas have amazing feet. Each foot is two pads with toenails. They leave a track on the ground that looks like an elk or a deer hoof (Ask me some day about the trick I played on behalf of a bunch of elk hunters’ wives who were left back at the camp I came walking through), but the llama foot is entirely different, soft and padded. Snow always melts from the bottom, so narrow feet would just break through in what we call “post-holing.” Just as a camel has a wide foot to distribute their weight on the sand, so a llama has a wide foot to protect the fragile soil and to cross melting snow banks.
House-pet llamas have toenails that you have to trim with rose clippers, but in the wild, long toenails allow the llama to grip the snow.
They really have a low impact. The Forest Service even did a study and proved that a fully loaded pack llama still does less trail damage than a backpacker in boots.
Llamas also have a split lip that they use to push leaves aside to get at specific berries or flowers. I’ve seen a llama clean off a huckleberry bush. Because llamas do not have long tongues – just short stubby tongues that they use to tenderly tear off plant tops – they don’t have the ability to lick off the afterbirth on a newborn baby, called a cria. A wet cria would die in hours if it was born in the middle of the night, but mama llama’s only give birth during the day and usually near the time of full sunlight from 10am to 3 pm. This allows the newborn cria to dry off. They also start walking within hours – spindly little legs, tripping over themselves, then dancing and leaping. By nightfall the llama is nursing and traveling with mama.
So llamas make me believer in a God, who so loved the world, the creation, the life, that he sent his son, Jesus. Llamas declare to me the love of a God who provides the daily bread for all of creation. Llamas are just one part of the choir of God singing praise to the Creator, but they are one part of the choir I can sing along side of.
by Peter Illyn, Director
I had an old male llama named Benny. He wasn't a gelding; he was an intact male, if you know what I mean. While the rest of the llamas had their heads to the ground eating grain, Benny would be standing at the fence line looking over the horizon dreaming about mating.
One day my daughter looked up the window and said. “Daddy our llamas are in the front yard… no wait! Those aren’t our llama's!” An abandoned herd of female llamas had been running wild in the county for the past month, I later learned from police. They stopped running, however, when they came to my farm. Benny taught me a lot about prayer because that night was the best night of his life. He was an old llama, the best packer I ever had. He didn’t live much longer after that night – but he made a baby! You go, old man!
So 360 days later, I was blessed when one of the mama llamas named Dottie gave birth to a little brown male who looked just like his daddy. Click here to continue reading about how llamas help me believe in God and learn interesting facts like "the Incan word for dried llama meat was 'jer-que,' which is where we get the term jerky." (I used to threaten my llamas that if they didn't behave, I would see they ended up next to the checkout counter at 7-11.)
Llamas have few defense skills – they are not very fast runners, they don’t have sharp hooves, fangs or claws, they are covered with soft wool. All they can really do when threatened is spit. It is rude, trust me, it only make the spit-upon angrier. Trust me, I speak from experience and confess to having cursed out a few llamas in my day. I hope God understands.
Instead of defensive mechanisms, like plating like on an armadillo, speed like a gazelle, or camouflage like a walking stick insect, God chose to give llamas and camels a special measure of providence – the ability to survive in ecosystems harsher than their predators can survive in – camels in the desert and llamas in the high mountains above tree line.
Llamas are amazingly adaptive creatures. They have elliptical blood cells, the opposite of sickle-cells found in the tropics; deeply curved and bright red, they’re able to latch on to the super thin oxygen at 14,000 feet above sea level. A llama’s blood is also bright, bright red – chock full of cells ready to grab all the oxygen they can get. As such, llamas became the perfect pack animals of the indigenous people of the Andes. They were able to travel from sea level to mountain top with ease.
I've seen llamas sitting motionless all night long, becoming completely covered in 6 inches of falling snow. Their hair is also hollow with long outer hair that sheds rain and soft inner hair that keeps them warm. But when morning comes they stand up and shake off and wait for me to finish my cup of coffee before hitting the trail. The Incas would make clothes for themselves out of the softer inner wool, and rugs and bags out of the courser outer wool. Alpaca and vicunas, two cousins of llamas, have the softest fiber in the world.
A llama also has three stomachs. It is called a ruminant, one that breaks down food in a tri-step process, including regurgitating and re-chewing its cud. This ability allows animals like llamas and deer , who are most exposed to danger when they are grazing, to go out at dawn, fill up a stomach with plant matter, and then hide in the brush and spend the rest of the day chewing what they had gathered. Stomach acid also plays a large role as everything they eat rots and breaks down. That is the sour mash a llama spits when perturbed.
This trait, however, is one of many of God’s provisions. “Even their poop don’t stink,” was one campaign ad we considered. Llamas excrete hard pellets, similar to an elk’s. Unlike a horse’s one stomach, llama dung has gone through three stomachs. This means llama dung is virtually odorless, invasive seed free and low in nitrogen and phosphorus. It is a great fertilizer and will not burn the delicate plants.
Llamas are browsers, not grazers. They eat grass but also twigs, bark, charcoal, shrubs. They can process low levels of protein and carbohydrates, as low as 1 to 2% so they can live on dry lands. They are easy to care for in the wilderness – in fact, all the world is a salad bar to a llama. They are happy to walk and graze along the trail all day long. It also means you do not have to carry much supplemental feed when traveling with a llama. You just need to give them time in the morning and evening to browse.
Llamas also have only lower front teeth. This allows them to rip the top of grass off, but prevents them from tearing the roots or pulling the plant out of the ground. This way the llamas get the nourishment of this year’s solar growth found in the plant, but keeps the roots intact for an easier grow-back. This way, llamas do not overgraze the fragile meadows of the high plains.
Llamas have amazing feet. Each foot is two pads with toenails. They leave a track on the ground that looks like an elk or a deer hoof (Ask me some day about the trick I played on behalf of a bunch of elk hunters’ wives who were left back at the camp I came walking through), but the llama foot is entirely different, soft and padded. Snow always melts from the bottom, so narrow feet would just break through in what we call “post-holing.” Just as a camel has a wide foot to distribute their weight on the sand, so a llama has a wide foot to protect the fragile soil and to cross melting snow banks.
House-pet llamas have toenails that you have to trim with rose clippers, but in the wild, long toenails allow the llama to grip the snow.
They really have a low impact. The Forest Service even did a study and proved that a fully loaded pack llama still does less trail damage than a backpacker in boots.
Llamas also have a split lip that they use to push leaves aside to get at specific berries or flowers. I’ve seen a llama clean off a huckleberry bush. Because llamas do not have long tongues – just short stubby tongues that they use to tenderly tear off plant tops – they don’t have the ability to lick off the afterbirth on a newborn baby, called a cria. A wet cria would die in hours if it was born in the middle of the night, but mama llama’s only give birth during the day and usually near the time of full sunlight from 10am to 3 pm. This allows the newborn cria to dry off. They also start walking within hours – spindly little legs, tripping over themselves, then dancing and leaping. By nightfall the llama is nursing and traveling with mama.
So llamas make me believer in a God, who so loved the world, the creation, the life, that he sent his son, Jesus. Llamas declare to me the love of a God who provides the daily bread for all of creation. Llamas are just one part of the choir of God singing praise to the Creator, but they are one part of the choir I can sing along side of.