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STUDENT DIARY
Sam Bowker
, Exeter, Devon
Fourth year veterinary student, Cambridge University
SUMMER 2013 ISSUE
LIVESTOCK MATTERS
26
About Me
I am a vet student in my fourth year of a
six year course at Cambridge University,
who has grown up on a mixed livestock
farm near Exeter in Devon. At home we
milk 150 Friesian-type dairy cows, lamb
300 ewes (of which I have a flock of 25
pedigree Charollais), run 20 Devon beef
sucklers, and until recently had an outdoor
herd of 750 sows.
We also have cider orchards, 60 acres
of spring barley, and run a Christmas
shop during the month of December,
selling trees, wreaths and meat from the
farm, with four reindeer helping to draw
the punters in! I'm a member of YFC at
home who loves sport, and I hope to
practise as a large animal vet once
I graduate.
Fun in the sun...
I write with the sun streaming through my window - not a
phrase that has been uttered much in the last ten months or
so! I'm back in Cambridge for the summer term, and it is a joy
to be able to go to lectures in shorts and a t-shirt; everyone
seems to be a lot jollier this term. This, according to the fifth
and sixth years, is the best term of our clinical years, and we
are determined to enjoy it.
The Easter vacation was very busy but hugely
enjoyable. I started off doing two weeks
of equine work experience in Devon, which
was surprisingly very interesting (I am not
known for my love of horses - the phrase
‘expensive pets’ occasionally springs to my
mind). The vets were excellent at letting
me get hands-on, and highlights included
a gamma ray bone scan, which uses
radioactivity to find skeletal problems, as well
as a day at the Exeter races on official duty.
After that, I travelled up to Wiltshire for two
weeks of farm practice. I experienced a lot,
from blood sampling and de-tusking boars to
bull fertility testing. It was pleasing to find that
I am becoming more adept at fertility work in
cows, but perhaps the best experience I had
was being allowed to do most of an LDA
operation - I got the chance to manoeuvre
the abomasum back into place and then
sew the cow up.
The consultancy aspect of being a farm vet
is something that hugely excites me, and I'm
keen to build up as broad a knowledge base
as possible before I graduate. Related to this,
the use of sand on dairy farms as bedding
was something that intrigued me seeing it in
practice. Obviously it will vary farm to farm,
but the question of whether the health benefits,
in terms of mastitis and cow comfort, outweigh
the practical difficulties with slurry management
and machine wear is an interesting one - I
hope to look into it in more detail.
At home, the sun has meant Christmas trees
have been planted, the reseeding has finally
been done, and the cows are out day and
night. I've selected the Charollais lambs to be
kept for breeding, but sadly need to put out
an advert to sell the ewe flock as a going
concern (the growing work experience
requirements of the course have made the
flock unfeasible to run).
Anyway, better get back to the books - we
have an animal breeding exam next week
that requires a bit of revision!
Do the health benefits of sand bedding outweigh
the practical problems
?