Peter Littmann

Paul, When some else has a problem with something that we have done or haven't done it is just that THEIR PROBLEM. Everyone of us need to accept responsibility for how we react to something others do. We are all given a level of grace to even be alive in the first place, lets enjoy that grace together. Cheers Peter

Patrick, Fire up the chainsaw, forcing goats to eat that amount of conifers without about 500% more minimum forage that isn't conifer wooded forage would be toxic to the goats. Goats will eat conifers but only in small percentages of total daily ingestion of forage. Besides a chain saw is far less total maintenance. Appropriate technology. Good luck. Peter

R Hasting,When you introduce new animals into your herd how long do you isolate the newbees for observation, before they are allowed to interact with the established group? It may just be that the new animals had some type of virus that caused the deaths. Isolation can be with a pen as little as 20 meters of open space between any contact areas. Were your animals ingesting any White clover at the time of the deaths? Where were you at the time of the births? I don't mean to talk down about vets but the majority don't know squat about sheep or goats. That was told to me by my vet that had recently graduated from CO State. The only reason she came to help me is because she actually liked the critters. The call costs more than the animals worth. You will get more information from some of the production books that are available. DE works well for worming but getting the buggers to eat it is the trick. While I'm on a rant, only about 10-15% of all llamas are worth a damn as a guard animal, been there done that. Hope all is well with you otherwise. Mahalo