Farmer brings alpaca therapy to nursing homes and schools

Clodagh Kilcoyne, Reuters

Flanked by a gaggle of smartphone-wielding onlookers, Wicklow farmer Joe Phelan ushered two alpacas down the corridor of a local nursing home as beaming residents waited their turn to pet them.

A decade after ditching his office job for farming, 64-year-old "Alpaca Joe" has found a new job for his herd of 71 woolly South American camelids: animal therapy for the elderly and people with additional needs.

"They get to feel them. They look into their big, huge brown eyes, which, you know, just are so relaxing. And they might hear them humming," Phelan said.

"We work with local schools with their special-needs classes, and the teachers tell us that the impact on the kids is really positive."

Phelan initially looked into the more traditional types of farming that his family had been involved in for hundreds of years, but said he could not see a way to sustain a living.

Instead he started researching alternative farming options. He eventually bought seven alpacas and sold his home to buy a farm to graze them.

He started off with "alpaca & prosecco" treks and stocked a shop with alpaca wool socks and soft toys. But he soon noticed their potential to ease anxiety among older visitors and those with additional needs.

"We noticed that we were having a really positive impact on people with special needs, be it kids with autism, be it adults or adolescents with Down syndrome ... We just found that it lifted everybody's spirits," Phelan said in an interview at the K2Alpacas farm in Newtownmountkennedy, Co Wicklow.

The business now employs 11 people, has 71 alpacas and two much larger llamas, and offers accommodation to visitors.

Phelan packed two of his more sociable male alpacas into the back of a van for the trip to Oakfield Nursing Home.

"We know that we have certain boys and girls that are suitable for the therapeutic work," he said. He still had to gently scold the selected alpacas when they took a rest beside the patients.

The nursing home's activities coordinator, Sineád Meegan, came across the herd on TikTok. She said the residents were thrilled with the visit and she would invite them back again soon, "just to see the smiles on the faces".

"I think it triggered a lot of memories for people that would have grown up on farms," she said.