AlpacaKeepWhat records should you keep for alpacas?
You do not need to track everything from day one. Here is the short list, and below it the honest steer on where to start.
Identity: name, animal ID or registry number, microchip, ear tag, date of birth, sex, colour, and sire and dam.
Health and medicine: each treatment, the dose, product details, and the withdrawal period supplied by your vet or product instructions.
Breeding: matings, pregnancy confirmations, and projected due dates.
Cria: birth weight and the early weight checks that catch a fading newborn.
Movements on and off the farm, and deaths.
Start with two sheets: the herd register for identity and the medication log for treatments. If your animals receive veterinary medicines, keep prescriptions, purchase evidence, and any official records required in your country alongside the sheet. Add the breeding record and cria weight log when you start mating and birthing.
The four free alpaca templates
Each template is a plain spreadsheet you can open in Google Sheets or Excel, plus a printable version for the barn wall. Grab the ones you need and ignore the rest.
1. Herd register. Your master list, one row per animal. This is the sheet a buyer or an inspector wants to see. The load-bearing columns are Name, Animal ID or registry number, Microchip number, Date of birth, Sex, Sire, and Dam, with room for colour, fibre type, origin, status, and location. For the sire and dam side of things (and how inbreeding stacks up), see our guide on alpaca pedigree.
2. Breeding record. Who was mated to whom, when, the outcome, and the projected due date. The columns that carry the sheet are Date, Dam, Sire, Pregnancy check date, Projected due date, and Outcome. For the due-date maths, use the cria-watch calculator rather than working it out by hand, and our alpaca breeding guide covers the wider picture.
3. Cria birth and weight log. The birth details plus the early weight checks that flag a cria falling behind. The birth block leads with Cria name, Date of birth, Dam, Birth weight (kg), and whether the cria nursed within 6 hours, then a repeating weight sub-table tracks weight, daily gain (g/day), and body condition. For what those weights mean and a healthy birth-weight range, read the alpaca cria growth curve guide.
4. Medication and treatment log. Use one row per treatment and animal to record the date, animal, product name, batch or lot, dose, route, who administered it, and the withdrawal period supplied by your vet or product instructions. The sheet includes meat and milk withdrawal-end columns for farms that need them. Keep prescriptions, invoices or purchase evidence, and any official register your authority requires; this practical log may not contain every field required in your country.
Which template do I actually need first?
Do not let four sheets paralyse you. Start with two: the herd register and the medication log.
The herd register gives you a single, tidy identity list for the whole herd. The medication log gives treatments a consistent place and helps you retain the information supplied by your vet or product instructions.
Add the breeding record and the cria weight log when you actually start mating and birthing. There is no prize for filling in columns for animals you do not have yet.
How to keep these sheets tidy for the long run
A few habits keep a spreadsheet from turning into a mess you stop trusting.
One row per animal, and never reuse an ID. If a name gets confusing, the microchip or registry number is the anchor that never changes.
Never delete a sold or dead animal. Mark its status and the date it left instead. Last year's records are the ones a buyer or an inspector asks about.
Date everything the same way, using ISO format (YYYY-MM-DD), so the dates sort correctly and never get muddled between day-first and month-first.
Keep one source of truth. Do not split the same animal across five tabs, a notebook, and a phone photo of a vet receipt.
Back it up. A spreadsheet lives or dies by the one laptop it sits on, so keep a copy in the cloud.
One honest limit: a sheet stores the withdrawal period or end date you enter, but it will not keep that period visible across the herd or remind you a booster is due. That is the gap an app fills.
Record-keeping rules vary: check your own country
These templates give you a practical starting point, but they are not a complete legal register for every country. Requirements depend on where and how animals are kept, so confirm the fields, supporting documents, and retention period with your own authority.
Last reviewed: June 2026. Confirm current rules with your own authority. This is not legal advice.
EU baseline: keepers of food-producing animals must retain specified veterinary-medicine information for at least 5 years under Regulation (EU) 2019/6, Article 108. Whether that category applies to your alpacas depends on their use and national requirements. The required information may sit across prescriptions, purchase evidence, and other farm records rather than in one app or sheet.
UK: the same 5-year medicine-record duty applies, and it survives the animal leaving your holding, being slaughtered, or dying (Veterinary Medicines Regulations 2013, as amended). Camelids are not on the GOV.UK list of livestock that require a County Parish Holding (CPH) number, so you do not need one simply to keep alpacas on your own land. Routine alpaca movements do not need a licence and there is no general ear-tag mandate, but ID and a movement licence are required to leave a bluetongue restricted zone, and IDs are needed for export or TB testing. Check the current position with APHA or the RPA.
Germany: register your holding (you get a Registriernummer) and keep a Bestandsregister under the Viehverkehrsverordnung, recording stock on hand plus every arrival (Zugang) and departure (Abgang) with the other party and the dates, retained 3 years. Your medicine log is the Arzneimittelbestandsbuch, kept 5 years. Austria is similar in spirit (register and keep a stock register with the Bezirksverwaltungsbehörde, reported within 7 days), but check the exact retention rule rather than copying the German figure.
Switzerland (not in the EU): New World camelids born from 1 November 2022 must be microchipped, but they are not individually registered in the Tierverkehrsdatenbank (TVD). Check current holding, survey, and movement-record duties with the BLV/OSAV or your cantonal authority.
United States: there is no general federal alpaca register or individual-ID mandate. Registration with the Alpaca Owners Association (AOA) is voluntary and pedigree-based, needing DNA parentage verification and a permanent ID such as a microchip. Interstate transport and veterinary-record requirements vary, so check your state department of agriculture or USDA.
Australia: a Property Identification Code (PIC) for the property and camelid waybills for movements are both mandatory under state and territory law. NLIS tagging for alpacas is currently voluntary. New Zealand runs a separate system (NAIT does not cover alpacas), so check your regional council or MPI.
Or skip the spreadsheet wrangling, free up to 10 animals
The sheets are genuinely yours to keep. But a spreadsheet will not remind you that a booster is due or keep active withdrawal periods visible across the herd.
Enter the treatment date and the withdrawal period supplied by your vet or product instructions, and AlpacaKeep tracks when that recorded period ends. You remain responsible for checking the correct period and any local rules before selling, moving, slaughtering, or using animal products.
AlpacaKeep also adds due-date reminders, pedigree and COI, fibre reports, and a printable medication history for review or sharing. It is a modern web app, so there is nothing to install and it works on any device. We built it on our own working alpaca farm in Val Gardena, South Tyrol.
On data: EU data residency in Frankfurt, GDPR rights including erasure, published security details, and export tools so you can take your records with you.
AlpacaKeep will be free for up to 10 animals when it launches (multiple users, 100 MB storage, EU-hosted). It is rolling out across the EU first through 2026. See features for the full picture and pricing for the paid tiers. Start with the free sheets today, and move up only when your herd outgrows them.