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WORKING
TOGETHER
FOR A HEALTHIER FUTURE...
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LIVESTOCK MATTERS
About me
I am a veterinary student in my third year
at the Royal Veterinary College. I grew
up mostly in South East London spending
every moment I could further south east
in Kent, working on farms and stable
yards. Having escaped living in London
to enjoy the fresh air of Hertfordshire with
the husband, dogs, cats, small furries,
reptiles, horses and my own small herd
of dairy goats.
All in a day’s work…
My need for a balance between clinical farm vetting and research
work has made my first year in practice slightly different from a
lot of my colleagues and friends, but I think it’s fair to say that
between the support I have received and opportunities I have
been given, Bishopton have made it a pretty successful one.
I graduated from the University of Liverpool
in summer 2014 and joined the ten vet
strong, ruminant team at Bishopton Vets
shortly after. An interest in farm animal
production and the maintenance and
promotion of production efficiency was
a key factor in my decision to become a
vet and is something that I had a primary
interest in throughout vet school training,
pushing me to want to work in farm
animal practice. I started the XLVets
Graduate Programme in September 2014
alongside eleven other recently qualified
vets to help develop our skills and interests
in farm animal practice. I have a keen
interest in infectious disease control and
youngstock health and management and
would like to develop my interests and
skills in these areas further as my career
develops. I also have a strong working
link with RAFT Solutions Ltd regularly
undertaking industry led research projects
alongside clinical work. Outside of work
I enjoy mountaineering and cycling and
am a keen singer.
GRADUATE DIARY
Katherine Lumb
, BVSc MSc MRCVS
Bishopton Veterinary Group
Carrying out high level research in practice
is an area of the veterinary industry,
particularly the farm sector, that is really
starting to grow and doing project work
with Bishopton and Synergy Farm Health’s
sister company RAFT Solutions has given me
opportunities that I never thought I would
reach in my first 18 months out of university.
Completing my first full project has given me
the chance to go and present this work to
industry leaders and design a poster for the
British Cattle Veterinary Association (BCVA)
congress this autumn. It was a slightly
surreal moment hanging a poster next to
the people I am used to reading about in
journals and textbooks, but a definite high
point of the year to think that I had
achieved something of that standard
alongside working as a real life, get
your hands dirty, farm vet.
The last six months have also seen a big
change in my on farm development as I have
taken on more and more herd responsibilities.
Taking on these responsibilities has meant
that I have been involved in everything from
regular fertility visits to writing herd health
plans and ongoing regular monitoring of
farm data. This has always been the area of
farm vetting that has interested me most and
I have really enjoyed getting stuck into it,
but it comes hand in hand with increased
responsibility which is something I think is of
the utmost importance, especially when
making farms run as efficiently as possible is
as important as it is at the moment. Working
more closely with individual farms has also
given me much more frequent and regular
interaction with individuals and given me
the chance to really develop relationships
with them. Although poles apart from
presenting posters at conferences, it is
again another real high point and sense
of achievement when a client rings you as
‘their vet’ for advice.
When I decided that I wanted to do a mix
of clinical work and research during my
final years of vet school I never really
thought it would be possible to do both
hand in hand to a standard that I would be
happy with. But as I look back over the last
year and what I have achieved it would
look as if I have nailed it to a tee. The
support and encouragement I have
received, from both colleagues and clients,
has helped me to become a good farm
vet but also created this extra string to my
bow with the research opportunities. As
my friends from university start to get the
two year itch and think about moving on
to new challenges, I feel more as though I
have really found my footing and hope to
just continue to develop and grow both with
clinical, on farm, work as well as with
scientific research.