Beloved 31-year-old llama Shorty dies as Guinness reviews claim he was the oldest on record

Digital Curator

(Video/photos: KHSL, IRON GIANTS DRAFT HORSE RESCUE, CNN via CNN Newsource) —

A llama named Shorty, who was believed to be 31 years old, died last week at a horse rescue in Northern California, where staff says he may have been the world’s oldest llama on record.

“Shorty was kind of the wise old grandpa of the property,” Jessi Carrillo, the co-founder of Iron Giants Draft Horse Rescue, told KHSL.

To give their horses and other animals more space, Carrillo and her family in December moved their horse rescue to Bella Vista, which is a rural community about 9 miles northeast of Redding, California.

While visiting the property and preparing to sign the lease, the landlord told the family that the agreement came with a caveat — a llama lived on the property and that caring for it was part of their contract.

Carrillo said neighbors helped them piece together Shorty’s age, including a memory from someone who moved to the area about 30 years ago and recalled him as a baby llama.

“We knew he was old, but we started talking to all the neighbors and this neighbor over here said ‘I moved here 30 years ago and he was a little baby llama, he was about a year old then,'” Carrillo explained to KHSL’s Timea Horvath. “So then we’re like ‘OK, how old, how long do llamas live?’ And we looked it up and it says 12 to 14 is the standard. We went ‘OK, he’s really old.’ And then we ended up looking up the Guinness Book of World Records and the oldest llama in history was 27 years old. It was like ‘You have him beat, you are officially the oldest llama in history.'”

But it’s not actually official that Shorty was the world’s oldest llama.

The rescue said Guinness World Records is going to continue reviewing Shorty’s application once proof of his age is submitted.

After he died, Iron Giants Draft Horse Rescue remembered him in a social media post, saying, in part, “he was a true legend that took hold of a massive piece of our hearts.”

“We never intended to bring in llamas, but God clearly had other plans, and we are forever grateful for the memories we have with you. Enjoy paradise my friend, you have earned it,” the post stated.

Talking to KHSL about the llama, Carrillo said Shorty was skittish around people but would “pop up” around the property when staff talked about him.

“He was very skittish of humans, very terrified of people and very standoffish, but adorable and funny,” Carrillo said. “We would catch him out in the field, you know, do whatever and we’d call him a pop up llama cause you wouldn’t see him anywhere, and then suddenly you’d talk about him and then you’d look out and he’s popped up over the fence, like you could talk about him inside it’s like he knew, you were talking and he would just pop up everywhere and he was just looking straight at you.”

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