I was talking with another goat person the other day and she was telling me that she will only use AGS. Her reasons are that ADGA reports all goats that are registered with them to the government. If the government wanted to they can, at anytime, come in and seize your goats, butcher them or keep them. I know this has happened with chickens and so I am curious if anyone else has heard of this too? She claims that AGS does not share any of their information with the government. I think if the government wanted our goats, they could easily find out any information they wanted. What are your guys thought on AGDA VS AGS. I am a member to both and have goats registered to both. I don't really have problems with either one. Just curious as to your reasons for being members to one or both or neither?
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Like most political info (goats and humans), there are a number of half-truths and distortions out there. Regardless of whether you are registered with AGS or ADGA, if you are on milk test, your info goes to the USDA. If you live in certain states, and you take an animal to the vet, and the animal is found to be positive for certain contagious diseases, the vet is required by law to report that to the state. And in some states, they will come and exterminate your herd. In other states, your herd will just be quarantined, which means you are not allowed to let any animals leave your property. This will happen regardless of whether or not you have registered animals. It varies from disease to disease and from state to state, which is rather annoying.
Back when NAIS was first an issue, AGS issued a statement against it, and ADGA issued a statement that was flaky. They said they understood the need for a tracking system but didn't come right out and support it; however, a lot of people saw their letter to the USDA as a statement of support and stopped registering their goats with ADGA.
If you show your goats, you have to have a scrapie ID number, which is as good as any other form of ID with the government because you are directly registering your herd with your state, so it really doesn't matter whether you're registered with AGS or ADGA.
And this is only the beginning. It is not nearly as simple as choosing one registry over the other. The only way to keep your herd off the radar would be to never milk test, never show, and never take your animals to a vet. And if you ever buy any out of state animals, you'd have to ask the seller to NOT get a health cert for you because those papers are sent to the state where the animal is being shipped so that your state vet knows you have them.
I heard about that, Patty!
None of our goats are registered anywhere mostly because we don't show them or anything and we don't want to tattoo them.
There are things about AGDA that I love and things that are frustrating. I love how you can do so much on line, without having to mail everything off. I like that you can see what goats you have registered, and mark them as sold or dead, register all the new babies online. I haven't seen anything like that on the AGS site. So there are pros and cons to both. I haven't done any showing, so show issues don't really matter to me. I agree that if the government wants something they can get it regardless. I agree with you Patty, seems like the government infringes upon our rights all the time anymore. Interesting topic! Thanks for responding...
Right now, the USDA/APHIS is working on a National ID plan to assign every milk and meat producing animal a PIN for easier tracking to their origin, so I don't see that it's going to matter one way or the other, but it does seem like ADGA is more big Ag. oriented than the others. They seem to support the plan (See Dairy Goat Journal, July/August 2012, USDA Continues Development of National ID Plan, page 8). Too bad, since that's the one I'm registering through. I'm thinking about changing that just because that's NOT what I want to support. However, I don't see that not being an ADGA member or registering goats through them is going to stall things very much since if the government wanted the info they could get it from any of the societies or lists available to the rest of us. Having unregistered animals would perhaps help you stay under the radar longer if you were concerned about that. This crazy plan does worry me, I must say. It seems a big infringement on our freedom to me. You can check out the plan HERE on the USDA website.
I am only a member of AGS and the reason is I don't show much and AGS is less expensive and much nicer to work with then ADGA at least in my experience.
Mac's Rainbow SKM
I am a member of ADGA only. I did do AGS but none of their shows are sanctioned around here. That meant I had to buy a special form from AGS for the judge to sign and turn that form in to AGS if I won anything. It was a pain. Everyone is ADGA around here. As for the government I have never heard of such a thing. If the government wanted your animals I think they would go ahead and take them anyway but that would only be the case if there was a serious disease.