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AUTUMN 2015 ISSUE
LIVESTOCK MATTERS
2 2
Go, Go, Go!
In stark contrast to my last update when things
were quiet during silage time and I was
managing to catch up on some much needed
herd health paperwork, this quarter has been
non-stop, which for me mostly means routine
fertility visits.
Losing a vet has become a great opportunity
for me to increase my number of routine farms
and multiplied the number of health and
disease discussions I have daily on farm. My
workload has grown exponentially and with it
my knowledge of all things farm vetting,
albeit along a very steep learning curve with
some peaks and troughs along the way. The
step up in workload seems to have coincided
nicely with the next crop of veterinary
graduates coming through the system, which
means that I’m now officially free of my ‘new
grad’ title although have nothing to fall back
on when things go belly up!
Recently I’ve helped to develop and run a
sheep discussion group for our sheep farmers
within the practice. We’ve managed to create
a small but focused group of farmers who are
keen to share knowledge and data alike in
order to progress their flocks. In our most
recent meeting I benchmarked and compared
each farms’ lambing and scanning figures
both within the group and also with previous
seasons. This allowed us to see how
vaccination status, tup-to-ewe ratio and breed
affected various parameters such as lambing
percentages or number of abortions. Everyone
was able to contribute in some way and I
trust take something new home with them with
the intention of improving their next lambing
season. For me this has been a welcome
break from the day to day dealings with dairy
cows and I’ve really enjoyed the unique
challenges involved in preventative sheep
work, something which I hope will pay off
come next lambing season. Who knows, with
tighter margins being forced upon sheep
farmers recently this may well become more
important than ever.
Since my last article we’re down a vet up here at our
Lancashire branch so it’s been time for me to shed my
new-grad wings and get well and truly stuck in!
GRADUATE DIARY
Matthew Hylands
, BVM BVS BVMedSci MRCVS
Lambert, Leonard & May
About me
I graduated from Nottingham vet school in
the summer of 2014 shortly before moving
to the scenic North West to pursue a career
in farm animal practice with the Lancashire
branch of Lambert, Leonard and May.
Coming from Northern Ireland I’m well used
to the rain, however the rural Lancashire
accent was another challenge altogether!
With most of our work being dairy based
I’m lucky enough to find myself in a position
of relative responsibility having a handful
of regular routines to my name already.
Having recently finished the XLVets
Graduate Programme I feel much more
confident in day-to-day practice life and
have also managed to find myself in a
larger network of farm animal new
graduates sharing information and
experiences on a regular basis.
Outside of work I enjoy shooting of any
kind and I’ve recently bought a mountain
bike to make the most of the beautiful fells
and moors up here.