“I feel for Ernie, I mean how would you feel losing your eye?” said Patrick Huff, senior at North Harford High School.

Ernie, North Harford’s fifteen year old Alpaca, has recently lost his left eye.

“He was grazing one day and one of the wooden weeds had poked him in the eye,” said Jordan Borkowski, senior.

“The wooden object had taken a chunk out of his eye,” said Elizabeth Poffenberger, senior. “The problem was that the eye became infected and we had to re-call out the vet.”

The Agricultural program tried to save the eye with antibiotics.

“We had to put Ernie on antibiotics for a little bit, but the infection had gone too far, so the best thing to do was to have the eye removed, unfortunately,” said Borkowski.

“The vet was really nice, and even gave us a deal on the surgery,” said Poffenberger.

But Ernie is making a full recovery.

“After the eye was removed, he had to have his eyelids switched together so the eyelids would grow together,” said Borkowski. “Luckily Ernie is adapting to not having an eye very well.”

“Ernie is doing really well, and we were even able to reunite Bert, Ernie alpaca friend, and Ernie in the field,” said Poffenberger. “It’s really fun it watch the two alpacas now, because ever since the surgery Bert has been very protective of Ernie.”

Many students of the North Harford Agricultural department are relieved that Ernie made such a nice recovery.

“I’m happy that Ernie didn’t pass away from the infection, because he is one of the sweetest alpacas we have here at North Harford,” said Poffenberger.

“It’s good the vets were able to take out the eye, because I believe that the infection could have been really uncomfortable for him,” said Borkowski. “I’m glad the he has made a full recovery and reunited with Bert.”

But even though Ernie now only has one eye, students are trying to see the light in the matter.

“Sadly we couldn’t save Ernie’s eye, but he would make a good pirate,” said Jessica Ruszkiewicz, junior.