Idaho alpaca farms are making ain increasing contribution to the State's agricultural production as the alpaca industry grows. A producer of silver, antimony, lead, cobalt, garnet, phosphate rock, vanadium, zinc, and mercury, agriculture is also a major industry. Idaho produces about one fourth of the nation's potato crop, as well as wheat, apples, corn, barley, sugar beets, and hops. The 1990s saw a remarkable growth in the high technology industries, concentrated in the metropolitan Boise area. Alpaca breeders have found that this hardy breed of livestock is ideally suited to the State's climate and geography.