Piccolo the goat grazes during a yoga session at Pink Alpaca Farms August 12. Photo by Sam McIntosh.

Roosters crowing, trucks driving past, and the chirps of a newborn silkie bantam chick.

Do these seem like the typical sounds of a yoga class? They are for Pink Alpaca Farms in Wellman. Kristi and Ryan Pearson have been renting a pink farmhouse a few miles west of Iowa Mennonite School, where they have taken in alpaca, horses, goats, chickens, kittens, and rabbits. It was last October the Pearsons and their friend yoga instructor Lindsey Morrison started hosting twice monthly farm yoga sessions. Kristi says, “I definitely prefer my outdoor yoga. I think it’s really nice to be grounded on the actual ground and to have sounds and sights and smells around you. And to be connecting to the natural world around while you’re doing your practice it just makes more sense to me.”

Rosa, Java, and Casper are three of the four alpaca residing at Pink Alpaca Farms in Wellman. Photo by Sam McIntosh.
Children, adults, and farm animals are welcome to take part in the yoga. Kristi says she allows the gentler animals to roam around participants during the class, “I think it’s super good for the people and also for the critters. I think the animals get socialized and get to meet a lot of different individuals and get used to big crowds coming through. And it’s really nice for the people to be able to learn about animals that they otherwise wouldn’t know about or be able to interact with. It’s a symbiotic relationship all around.”

Pink Alpaca Farms has two yoga events and a farm visit day scheduled for the month of September. They also have rabbits available for adoption, as several of their animals have come from area 4-H members.

A silkie bantam chick hatched shortly before the farm yoga session August 12. Photo by Sam McIntosh.