Rehabilitating Stanley, an Alpaca with Berzerk Male Syndrome

Posted on December 4, 2023

Last fall, I saw a lone alpaca on kijiji for sale and my heart went out to him. He was obviously the only one, and had been guarding sheep. Alpacas aren’t really great guard animals — they are not large enough and can’t really defend themselves very well against a predator like a coyote, especially when they are alone.

So we hitched up the horse trailer, filled up the truck and went north to a farm to get him. He was a lovely grey colour and I was excited to meet him! When we got there, we were surprised by how small he was, and even moreso, how friendly. The little 4 year old girl who lived there could hug his neck! We didn’t have a single alpaca among our 9 that would let anyone hug their neck!

When we got Stanley home, he continued to be surprisingly friendly and for those of you who know alpacas, you may be seeing the signs. I was not worried, although a tiny remote part of my mind was aware that he could have Berzerk Male Syndrome.

Berzerk Male Syndrome, or BMS, is when an alpaca — nearly always a male — starts attacking its owners. It can charge, body check, hit, bite, tackle and even try to mount and mate with people.

Stanley was friendly and enjoyed going nose-to-nose with us, and was often nearby. He really didn’t cause any trouble until the spring came. He rather suddenly got frisky and wanted to fight us — to wrestle the way that male alpacas do when they want to see who is dominant. The first couple of times he attacked without any warning, taking us very much by surprise. Darren got tackled 6 times — sometimes against a wall, often out in the open and ending up on the ground.

I got tackled twice. The first time, I thought Stanley wanted to go nose-to-nose, so I leaned toward him… and he just came at me full speed, hitting me with his chest. Luckily, I was near a grainery, so I landed against it, grabbed a nearby fence and was not hurt. I shouted at him, and kinda whacked him (don’t worry, it wasn’t that hard) on the back with my free hand. The second time he attacked, I was in the open and he knocked me down and then leaned down and bit my shoulder! I got up as quickly as I could and got away, but wow, was I ever rattled. The bite left a mark like a bruise but did not break the skin. I was lucky.

I decided it was time to research Berzerk Male Syndrome. Until then, all I had known was that it was caused by over-cuddling. You know all those pictures you see on the internet of people cuddling alpacas? In many of them, the alpacas aren’t really enjoying it, and in the others, they might be on the way to developing BMS.

I found an article that said BMS is caused by an alpaca bonding to humans instead of its alpaca mother. This is more likely to happen with bottle babies — hand-fed by humans — or general over-cuddling. You may had heard of baby birds bonding to the first thing they see upon hatching — if it’s a person, that bird will be your best friend for life. In the case of alpacas, the alpaca sees itself as a person, or sees people as fellow alpacas. The result is quite awful. Here’s another good article.

Although we were very discouraged and a little upset that the people selling Stanley didn’t tell us the truth, in some ways, I didn’t blame them. They had 3 kids including a newborn, a number of sheep and beef cows and were just trying to make everything work. They probably didn’t know what do to about Stanley and were afraid of him. I was also afraid, but did not want to give up on him. I believed that he could get better, so we set about a “training program” for him and for us to see if he could be rehabilitated. I had not heard of others doing this; some online material said that castration would help but others said that euthanasia was the only solution. I didn’t want to accept that, but we did decide to castrate him. I had hoped to breed him, but what if — what if — BMS was hereditary? I was not going to take that chance. We could not wait until breeding season either. By the middle of May , we were becoming afraid to walk around the yard. Breeding season wouldn’t be until June.

We arranged for his special appointment with the vet and she graciously allowed us to shear Stanley while he was looped up on sedative. His previous owners had trimmed his back and some of his neck, but he still needed more shearing. In fact, he had so much fibre growing on this belly and between his legs, when we got him, he had a poopy bridge of fibre going from one back leg to the other. I was able to cut that off the first day we had him, because he was so willing to stand still and let me near him. So, Stanley got “fixed” and we hope that it would fix the BMS as well.

Castrating him definitely helped, but I think our behaviour changes were also critical to our so-far success. Let me try to break it into chunks that make sense.

1. We stopped giving Stanley any extra attention. No more nose kisses, long eye contact, pets or long conversations (if you know what I mean). I would say good morning to him, but then also say good morning to every other alpaca around, looking at each one in turn. Stanley needed to feel like a part of the herd, and not a person. I do not believe that an alpaca with BMS could be rehabilitated without being in a herd of at least 6 others of the same gender. The hardest part of this rehab was not obsessing over him and if he was going to attack.
2. We kept an eye on him and we went around him. We tried to think like an alpaca — what sort of behaviour could be seen as aggressive? Meeting face-to-face on a narrow path — definitely. So we go around. Initially, I would give him 20 feet of space, going off the path that far to appear non-aggressive to him. Now, 5 feet is enough buffer, but I still go around. If we are out in the open yard, and he is standing between me and my destination with his head to the right, I go around to the left, around his bum. In no way do I want to be seen as starting something. There were times when Stanley was so frisky, we walked on a trail through the bush to avoid the yard completely to go around him.
3. We don’t continue the fight. When he would start something, we’d try to get away and stop the fight, rather than retaliate or try to “hold him still.” If you are an alpaca farmer, you know that holding them still can be hard. It can definitely feel like wrestling. A couple of times, I witnessed Darren getting attacked and had to remind him to let go and get away, not try to hold on to or subdue Stanley — that is too much like two males wrestling. Again, thankfully, we have 7 other males, so usually one of them would get interested in what was happening and as soon as we could get free, they’d get in there — either to save us or to have their own wrestling time with Stanley. Rupert, Pigpen and Frankie are all young enough, they don’t want to be left out of a summer wrestling match!
4. We watched for the signs. For Stanley, it became obvious when he was frisky. He would look straight at us, perhaps with his chin slightly up, and — the biggest sign — his tail would be slightly lifted. He looked like he was making himself tall. When we saw that, we knew what he was thinking and we backed away, raised a “stop hand,” and shouted NO at him. He understood that. I also tried not to raise my chin — that’s alpaca body language for “I’m going to spit at you,” or “I’m annoyed with you,” so I did my best to keep my chin down. Not that spitting was part of his fighting; it was much more of a full-body tackle. But I did not want Stanley to think I was an alpaca in any way, so I kept my chin level or slightly down.
5. We stayed calm and tried to be proactive. One afternoon, I was working in the shop. I knew he would be curious and maybe get too close, and that could lead to some wrestling. So I put a ladder across the shop door opening. This way, he could look but I could relax because I knew he couldn’t get in. Sure, he could have jumped over it, but he never had that much hatred in his veins. He just wanted to fight because fighting is what male alpacas do to establish who’s dominant. We needed him to know that WE WERE HUMANS, not alpacas, so we were not going to fight him and we could all live together peacefully AND we humans were in charge. Peacefully in charge. It is hard when there is a pattern of attacking to stay calm, but it is important. Alpacas are very empathic and they’ll feel your nerves.
6. We changed some of our physical signals. Normally, to move the boys in, I put my hands out to the side like a letter T or a walking fence panel and they know to walk the other way. I can corral them pretty easily, especially if they can see the open gate they are supposed to go through. I was afraid that Stanley might think me putting my arms out to the sides was an invitation to a hug, so I never did it. Sometimes, if he didn’t want to go in, he got to stay out. Other times, I was able to “shoo” him in with a casual, low-down forward motion of my hands. One time, I used a broom handle held horizontally at waist level and he seemed to get the message. I absolutely do not go nose-to-nose with him, even if there is a fence between us. He sometimes wants to, but I don’t. It’s too familiar, and I don’t want to remind him of people who hug and kiss him. One time I had gotten too close, I held my forearm horizontally in front of my body at about boob height, and he understood that as “stay back” body language.

I wish I knew Stanley’s backstory, but I don’t. I wonder if he was a bottle baby. I wonder if he caused trouble at his first farm, was sold to the sheep and beef farmers we got him from, and he was okay for a while and then got aggressive as he got older? At the farm with NO other alpacas, he had to fight the people — maybe he even tried with the sheep but that wouldn’t work either. That’s another reason alpacas need to be in groups of at least 3 of their own gender.

Let me share a few other surprises we had. When he is wearing a halter and on a leash, he can still lunge at you. After we got him fixed, we had to keep him separate for several days to heal, and the last day, he was tired of going in that other barn and didn’t want to. We tried chasing, but ended up haltering him and he lunged at Darren. Perhaps it might work to have 2 people with leashes the leashes taut, but this would require a lot of coordination and also has the hazards of all those leashes to get tangled in. You really do have to think ahead when you are planning some farm activity you’ve never done before.

Please, if you are an alpaca farmer reading this, or considering getting alpacas, DO NOT cuddle them at any age. Keep cria with their mothers or other females if their mother has died. We had to bottle feed one cria, but we did not snuggle him before or after, and I’m so glad that Frankie is totally normal!

Also, don’t take this article to be everything you need to know about working with a berzerk male. Some of them truly may not be savable. I don’t think you can be successful if you only have a couple of alpacas. My other boys were crucial in teaching Stanley how to be an alpaca. How could I possibly do that? The herd showed him what behaviour was acceptable. How do I know they learn from each other? Pigpen briefly adopted a couple of Stanley’s behaviours and we stopped those right away with strong language, and Pigpen has never done it again. So they can definitely learn from each other, but as I said before, the humans on this farm are peacefully in charge.

I’m happy to report that Stanley has been well behaved for quite some time. He is still very curious and is often nearby, watching us work as if to help. But then he loses interest and wanders off or goes back to grazing randomly on the yard! Yay! We are not the focus of his attention and he is not the only focus of ours. He is still a bit unpredictable, intensely curious of and occasionally aggressive with new people. He recently chest-bumped a wooden fence because a friend of mine came over for the first time. She was giving him attention of course and he lunged at the fence. A few months ago, he ran across the yard and would have tackled another friend of mine (a horsewoman who is very tough and would have actually been okay) if I had not intercepted and stopped him with my hand against his neck!

Even though we haven’t figured out everything there is to know about rehabilitating a BMS alpaca, I wanted to share what we have learned. I hope this may help someone out there. Don’t cuddle your alpacas. Don’t knowingly get a BMS alpaca unless you have a herd and lots of experience with healthy alpacas. Berserk Male Syndrome is serious and you can be seriously hurt. Don’t give up too soon; for Stanley, this progress has been over several months and we have had him over a year. And don’t be afraid to admit defeat and get help from other farmers, or euthanize him. But please don’t lie and rehome him.