Homestead mailing list

["Marie McHarry" <mmcharry AT dtnspeed.net>]

<<The number of personel to 
manage a mandatory NAIS just in this hollow is staggering and the number
required 
to enforce it against the people's lack of cooperation defies the
imagination.>>

I suppose that this is something that I should look into, but somehow I find
it hard to believe that a government that is rapidly going broke is going to
be able to track chickens. Sheesh, I can't even track my own guineas.

A few years ago, the government was trying to keep track of goats so that
herds could be declared free of scabies; at least that's to the best of my
memory, which admittedly isn't much when it's a topic that is of less than
no importance (and, alas, some important ones too). The number of voluntary
participants was underwhelming -- not surprising since scabies in goats is
extremely rare. The few reported cases have been goats that were pastured
with infected sheep for long periods of time. In other words, it's a cure
without a problem. This is not to say that goats don't have some endemic
diseases that ought to be addressed, but scabies isn't one of them.

We're living in a country where the government can't fund port security and
is going trillions of dollars into debt to irritate the Arab world and turn
the Undecideds there into bona fide terrorists. To imagine that we'll have
inspectors climbing into the trees to see if the hens and guineas are in
compliance -- well, I suppose it will be interesting to see how it all works
out.

Marie