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As I sit here writing, Hurricane Dennis is skirting the coast of North Carolina and is literally knocking at my door. With inspiration like this I thought that it might be prudent for me to talk about disaster preparation for goat owners in this issue. A disaster can come in many forms – flood, tornado, blizzard, or hurricane, just to name a few. No matter where you live or what kind of goats you raise, everyone can benefit from having a well-prepared disaster plan prior to a disaster event. As they say – failing to plan is the same as planning to fail. Here are a few tips on what you can do. What you can do before a disaster strikes? First, familiarize yourself with the types of disasters that could occur in your area, including man-made situations such as chemical spills near highways. Develop a written plan of action for each. Include a list of resources (suppliers, trucks and trailers), emergency phone numbers and people who can help during an emergency. These people include your local veterinarian, state veterinarian, local animal shelter, animal control officer, county Extension agent, local agricultural schools and the American Red Cross. These numbers should be kept with your disaster kit in a secure, but easily accessible place. Review this Disaster Plan regularly with everyone involved in your farming operation. If it becomes necessary to evacuate your herd be prepared by identifying evacuation host sites well in advance of the need. Possible evacuation sites might include state and county fairgrounds, stockyards and private farms, just to name a few. Contact your local Cooperative Extension agent or animal control officer to help you identify evacuation host sites. Once you choose your evacuation sites, you will need to map out routes to each. Alternate routes should also be mapped out in case the planned route is inaccessible. Include these evacuation sites and routes in your Disaster Plan. If you do not own trailers and/or trucks capable of hauling your stock, identify and locate suitable transportation well in advance of an emergency. Make sure that the drivers of these vehicles are experienced in hauling livestock. Also, whenever possible, accustom your goats to being loaded into these vehicles in advance so they're less frightened and easier to move when an emergency arises. Keep vaccinations and boosters up-to-date. Record the dates, dosages and types of medications and health products the goats have received. Keep this information with the Disaster Plan. Permanently identify your goats. This will help you to recover your goats in case they escape or are lost in the disaster. I recommend tattoos and ear tags. If you use only ear tags, make sure to place one in each ear so that if one is ripped out or lost in some other way, the goat can still be identified. Neck chains can be very dangerous for a goat in this kind of situation as they may become entangled on fallen trees and other debris and may result in strangulation of the goat. Another good idea is to photograph and inventory (by age, sex, weight, breed) your animals. Identify in writing, which goats (such as breeding stock) are of the highest priority or most valuable, in the event only some of them can be saved. Make sure others know your plans. Keep this information with your Disaster Plan. In case evacuation is not possible or feasible, survey your property for the best location for animal confinement in each type of disaster. Identify food and water sources that do not rely on electricity, unless you have a back-up generator. If you regularly depend on electricity to feed or water your goats, you should seriously consider purchasing a portable back-up generator. A portable generator can provide substitute power; however it must be properly sized to start the appliances and equipment you want to run. In order to choose the right sized generator; find the wattage of the equipment you want to run by checking the nameplate. Motor- driven appliances may be listed in horsepower, which must then be converted to watts. Motors require four times as much power to start as they do to run. If the running wattage is 400, then the starting wattage will be 1,600. The following table gives some starting and running wattage for electrical motors:Watts Required
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