This piece was originally published in Canada’s National Observer and appears here as part of our Climate Desk Partnership. Goats are an overlooked tool in the arsenal for rural, isolated communities to improve their resiliency during the COVID-19 pandemic, according to a pair of farmers from a remote island in British Columbia. And not in the questionable way medieval doctors advised families to share quarters with smelly billy goats, so the pungent odor would counteract the sickening miasma, or “bad air” associated with the bubonic plague. Farmers Janice and Gerald Ammundsen have long encouraged folks on Quadra Island who possess adequate forage land to consider adding a goat to their household to improve food sovereignty, both at a family and community level. “We’re trying to push the availability of goats into people’s backyards and create a situation where a family can produce its own dairy and meat in a sustainable way,” said Gerald, who has an agriculture degree with a specialty in dairy science.