I have received several herdsman questions that do not require lengthy answers thus, I will respond to a medley of questions.

Question:

Will my herd build up a resistance to Ivormectin for meningeal? I have been giving injections for about two years, 1 cc per 100 lbs., March through October. Should I switch to something else and if so what? Also, I would like to know if Ivomectin is effective for tapeworm.

Answer:

I confirmed with my veterinarian, Dr. Ramseyer, that there is no evidence that llamas build up any kind of resistance to Ivomectin. The dose you are giving should be effective. However, there is evidence in a new study that llamas should get 1 1/2 times the cattle dose on all wormers. I would also suggest that you rotate to a different wormer the rest of the year. I would rotate between Panacur and Synantic.

You did not mention how often you are injecting with Ivomectin. It appears that once every 40 to 44 days is often enough to prevent meningeal problems.

Ivomectin is not effective for tapeworms. You need to use Synantic in liquid form or Drocit in injectible form. For very bad cases, I would use Dracut. A warning — please do not give any kind of wormer to your females the last 3 months of pregnancy. It can cause an abortion.

Question:

We saw you spitting at a llama to discipline him. Does this work?

Answer:
Yes, it does.

When working with animals it is often helpful if you can put yourself in the role of the animal. This is especially true with llamas. In studying llamas one observes that they do not routinely touch each other except during periods of extreme aggression. If they want to get another llamas attention, they do it with body posture or by spitting in that llama’s face. It is also interesting that the more aggressive herd members always spit on the more submissive herd members, not the other way around. Some years ago I decided if I wanted the llamas to respect me as the alpha llama of the herd, I would need to think and act like a llama. I started to use body posture, head up and back, and to spit in the face of my llamas whenever they did not behave or were obnoxious when feeding, handling, training or showing.

Having been conditioned to my behavior, most of our llamas respect and pay attention when I simply use the change in body posture and when that doesn’t work, I am quick to spit in their face as a solid reminder that I am still the alpha herd member. When I quickly need to get a llama’s attention, just the posture and sound of me spitting usually gets their attention in short order.

As I said, it does work but one needs to use it routinely so the llamas understand the significance.