The vicuña is a member of the camel family which is native to South America. It is closely related to the llama, alpaca and guanaco. The vicuña is the national animal of Peru, and it's population is threatened. Up until 1964 there was unrestricted hunting of the vicuña, and this made the number of vicuñas drop to only 6,000. It officially became endangered in 1964, and it became illegal to trade vicuña fibre. In Peru from 1964-1966 the Pampa Galeras Refugio para Vicuña was created, which is a conservation area for the vicuña. More people helped to protect the vicuña and stop poaching, and the vicuña population in Peru increased to almost 75,000. Today, the vicuña has been reclassified to threatened, but the vicuñas in Equador are still considered endangered.

For more information see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vicu%C3%B1a