nscd cacher problem

[JD]

  I am running nscd-2.12-2.i686 on F13.

my /etc/resolv.conf contains:
nameserver 127.0.0.1
followed by other nameservers from my provider.
I am using the default nscd.conf file

My email client is Thunderbird.

Every time i check for email, or send a message,
thunderbird takes it many seconds to find the ip address
of pop.gmail.com

Similarly, firefox takes it sometimes almost 60 seconds to resolve
web site ip addresses.

Mu machine is not loaded at all. I have other
machines (windows) on same subnet and are mostly quiet,
but  they do not have this problem.

What do I need to do as far as configuration to make nscd a better cacher?