Difference between llama and alpaca

As you can see from the photo below, there really are a lot of differences between Llamas and Alpacas. The Llama is roughly twice the size of the Alpaca and the Llama has a very coarse outer coat over a softer inner coat as opposed to the alpaca which has a very fine, single coat. In addition, the Llama produces far less fiber per animal than the alpaca despite its much larger size. This is because the Alpaca was domesticated and carefully bred for over 5000 years as a luxury fiber producing animal. The Llama has been bred for the same amount of time as a pack carrying animal. The alpacas in the photo below are recently shorn but you can see many photos of full-fleeced alpacas elsewhere on this website.

From time to time, I will hear people say that Alpacas have a nicer disposition than Llamas or vice versa. Neither of these statements is true. Both are very friendly, curious and easily trained and handled as long as they were not handled incorrectly by their previous owners.

The Llama and the Alpaca can interbreed and produce live offsping and those offspring are also fertile. There is no point in doing this on purpose however. The result of such a breeding would be an animal that was neither as strong as the true Llama nor would it have as nice a fleece as a true Alpaca.