I keep most of them on research, 1 on farming, and 1 on building. It seems I either run out of food before I can get to the 3rd level of farming. I cannot seem to get the 50k tech points required for the fishing.

You should try playing your first game on the easy setting until you develop a good game strategy.

Why are you building...don't have babies till you get farming. Then only have a few till you get fishing.

I am playing on easy, I think I have had 4 or 5 colonies die on me. So far this last one, nobody is sick and I am not letting them have babies yet until I can get the food supply up. It seems the crops have been taking forever to re-grow. I do have a couple of them on the berry bush and I do not have any kids to collect the mushrooms either.

Hi,
I actually did the reverse and had as many babies as I could - in lean times, you can get them to pick mushrooms! Also I found putting it on 1/2 time when I was away from the game, then on 2X when actually playing helped to nip any problems in the bud.

Thanks for everybody's input and advice. I woke up this morning and my village is much improved. Nobody died! I thought I paused it, by going to the menu screen but it didn't pause. I am glad it didnt. Thanks again.