Honley Show
After the disastrous washout of last year, this year’s Honley Show was as glorious as the blue skies and sunshine overhead.
The Honley Show weekend is always a busy weekend for Donaldson’s as we load vehicles and head up to the showground to man our stall for the day. This year was an especially busy one for me as I was not only helping on our stall but was also trying my hand at sheep showing.
On Friday afternoon, we headed up to the show ground with the marquee to start to set things up; then it was an early start on Saturday morning to put the finishing touches to the stall and displays. This year, we had opted for a children’s theme with “hook a duck”, “guess the number of bonio biscuits in the box “and “guess what’s on the X-ray” competitions along with a children’s dressing up area with animal themed face masks.
As always, Donaldson’s supplied the official show Vet and this year, Andrew Arnold stepped up to the mark. He was helped on the stall by nurses Rachel Booth and Leah Hirst who entertained families tirelessly throughout the day.
It was great to see the huge numbers of people flooding into the showground throughout the day and our stall was busy all day long.
For my part, I spent the day hopping between the Donaldson’ s stall and the sheep showing area as we decided to try our hand at sheep showing. We have two Southdown Rams called Julius and Augustus and we decided to enter Julius in the Rare Breed Ram class.
I take my hat off to those who showed several sheep because preparing a sheep for a show is a time consuming business. I started Julius’s preparations about 2 weeks before the show. Firstly, he had a foot trim, and then a full wash, shampoo and dry to get the worst of the winter’s grime out of his dense fleece. Next I spent hours and hours “carding” him which is essentially grooming with a fine wire brush. The carding helps to get rid of matted wool, clumps of lanolin, grass seeds etc. Hand shears are used to trim the fleece and accentuate his body shape.
Training him to wear a halter (a type of collar) and walk on a lead rope was a further challenge although he got the hang of that quite quickly and skipped along happily like a dog going for a walk.
When we arrived at the show ground on Saturday morning, we were met by Richi and Sally , the Sheep Secretaries who did a great job of guiding us, the sheep showing novices, in the right direction.
At the allotted time, I donned my regulation white coat, and led Julius out into the show ring and he behaved immaculately – all that time walking him round our garden had not been wasted. He was examined thoroughly and was eventually awarded a second place rosette in the Rare Breed Ram category and we were also presented with a rosette that had been forwarded by the Southdown Sheep Society for having the best (and only) Southdown Sheep at Honley Show.
The Humble Flea….
What a wonderful start to the Great British summer! Long dog walks in the countryside, and long hours of basking in the garden shade for our cats: happy times.
However, we must not forget that the rise in ambient temperature is also conducive to a rapidly expanding flea population. As the temperature rises, the life cycle of the flea accelerates, and under optimal conditions, one flea laying 200 eggs, can progress to 200 adult fleas within 7-10 days.
Of course, 10 days later, 200 fleas becomes 40,000 fleas which multiply to become 8 million fleas in a further 10 days!
No wonder then, that a recent national survey of 1,000 UK pet owners found that more than a half said they or a family member had been bitten by a flea, and one in eight had been confronted by a guest after being bitten by a flea in the home. Over 30% of respondents had found fleas on clothing, furniture, and even their own body.
An interesting aspect of the flea life cycle is than only the adults live on the pet (or human) host. The eggs are laid into the pet’s haircoat, and subsequently drop off into the household and carpet everywhere the pet spends time, especially when scratching. The eggs hatch into larvae, which then pupate, to finally emerge as adults which will look to feed on you or your pet!
Of all the lifestages, less than 5% (the adult fleas) live on the host: 95% are in the environment. Surprising then that fewer than 50% of owners treat the household as well as their pets. This is one of the main reasons that an established flea problem appears to fail to respond to treatment: as fast as the adults are killed on the pet’s coat, newly emerging adult fleas take over! Clearly then, it is important to treat the flea stages in the environment of your pet as well as its environment.
Vets are uniquely placed to prescribe the strongest, most effective prescription-strength flea treatments available, and are very happy to discuss their appropriate use, along with any other queries you may have on this most interesting, but rather unpleasant parasite.
Schmallenberg Virus Update
Schmallenberg Virus was big news last summer. Since then, much of the media spotlight has moved away but it has continued to be a very large concern for livestock farmers. It has been announced this week that a Vaccine has been developed and should be available this summer.
The virus, which emerged in the Netherlands and Germany in 2011, can lead to sheep and cattle having stillborn or deformed offspring. The disease is passed between livestock by midge bites.
Reports from farmers suggest that at least 1,700 farms throughout the UK have now tested positive for the SBV virus and the disease has spread to every county in England and Wales, and was recently reported in Scotland. Schmallenberg virus (SBV) also causes fever, diarrhoea and loss of milk production in adult cattle.
At Donaldson’s Vets, we have seen a number of cases in sheep which lambed in December and January and we suspect that this was caused by exposure in early pregnancy last summer. Though there are few reasons to be grateful for our washout summer last year, we suspect that the midge activity dropped off rapidly as the cold summer continued and so those animals which became pregnant later in the season and which lambed later this spring, seem to have been less affected.
The first SBV vaccine, developed by the animal health company Merck MSD, is expected to be available to UK farmers in the summer. The vaccine is of most use before sheep and cattle become pregnant, as exposure to the virus during pregnancy can cause birth defects in the unborn animal. It is welcome news for British farmers to have the choice to vaccinate their animals. The vaccine will give extra assurance against this disease as the natural immunity sheep and cattle develop after initial exposure is not proven to prevent disease the following year.
Some farmers have lost up to 40% of their early lambing flock to the virus. The vaccine will give added reassurance to farmers who were concerned about losing lambs to the disease. Everybody in farming who wants to use it will welcome it as soon as possible. Some flocks need it in the next few weeks to fit in with their breeding programmes. UK farmers will soon be the first in the EU to have access to the vaccine.
POISONING: URGENT WARNING!
This week has been a very distressing week for everyone at the Maple Street Surgery as we have had to deal with two dogs which died very suddenly after a suspected poisoning while out on a walk.
On Saturday afternoon, the owner was walking his two dogs in Hall Heys Wood between Meltham and South Crosland. Both dogs were very suddenly taken ill and started convulsing. The owner called his wife, who met them in the car and they were immediately rushed to the surgery but were pronounced dead on arrival.
It all happened very suddenly and the owners of the dogs were absolutely distraught. Both dogs were young, fit and healthy and so there was immediately a strong suspicion that they had eaten something poisonous.
Post-mortem examinations were carried out on the dogs and samples have been sent for toxicology reports to establish cause of death. The area has been searched but nothing has been found. West Yorkshire Police and Natural England have been informed and are carrying out investigations into the incident.
Our Vets and the owner of the dogs remain concerned about the possibility of further animals being affected. If a wild animal were to consume the poison, it could be that the original source is spread over a wider area and it is a popular area for dog walkers.
Please be careful when walking your dogs in the area. Seek immediate Veterinary attention if you think your pet may have come into contact with anything suspicious or comes into direct contact with any dead wildlife in the area. If you see anything suspicious or know anything that may assist, please contact Donaldsons Vets on 01484 421512 or Dc Bryan Butterworth who is the West Yorkshire Police Wildlife Crime Officer on 01484 436565
Clinical Club
One of the benefits of being part of a larger Veterinary Group is that we have a number of vets with special interests in certain areas of veterinary medicine or surgery. The ethos of Donaldson’s has always been to ensure that all of our Vets can turn their hand to all aspects of Veterinary work but inevitably, while medicine and surgery become more advanced and specialized, individual clinicians will develop a deeper knowledge in some areas of special interest.
Within the Practice, we tend to refer some specialist cases to the Vets who are most suited to deal with them. This provides a high standard of care and also maintains and grows the knowledge and experience of the Vet.
We also try to ensure that the knowledge is disseminated from the Vet with the special interest to the other Vets within the Practice. We do this by holding regular “Clinical Club” meetings. One such meeting was held at our Birchencliffe Surgery last Thursday.
After evening surgery finished at 7.00pm, the waiting room was transformed into a lecture theatre. Vets, nurses and receptionists from across the group met for a bite of pizza and two clinical lectures given by two of our vets on areas of special interest they hold.
Celeste Lopez Plantey is a Vet who has recently joined our Practice having worked alongside one of the most respected Veterinary Dentistry specialists in the country. While able to tackle all aspects of mixed veterinary practice, Celeste has a special interest in dentistry and she gave a fascinating lecture on dental X-rays and advanced tooth extraction techniques.
Celeste’s lecture was followed by a lecture from Vet Rhona Warnock who works at the Animal Rehabilitation Centre at Birchencliffe Surgery. Rhona is fully qualified in Veterinary Acupuncture and she gave a most interesting lecture on the science behind acupuncture and its clinical applications.
The evening proved to be a great educational and team bonding exercise, and helped to raise awareness of these advances among all the clinical staff.
Our work with the RSPCA
In addition to the bulk of our caseload for individual animal owners, Donaldson’s Vets provide veterinary services for a number of kennels, catteries and rehoming centres in the region. We also do a lot of work with the RSPCA and the Kirklees Dog Warden Service.
Our work with the RSPCA falls largely into two categories: the services that we provide for the RSPCA Inspectors and the services we provide to the “Huddersfield and Halifax RSPCA” which are our local branch.
The local branch of the RSPCA is now based at The Animal Home in Halifax. The local branch deal with stray animals and do a tremendous job of rehoming animals, many of whom have been living rough or have been neglected, to loving homes. Despite their limited resources, the local branch do a great job of vetting prospective owners to ensure that all animals go to homes which can serve their needs so that the cycle of straying and rehoming is not repeated. We are often called upon to health check, neuter and vaccinate these animals to ensure that they are fit for rehoming and that they do not suffer from unwanted pregnancy that could add to the population of strays.
Our workload with the RSPCA Inspectors is varied. The Inspectors are often asked to deal with stray and injured wild and domestic animals and so we see everything from injured birds, rabbits and cats to badgers, foxes and deer.
The other aspect of the RSPCA Inspectors work which calls on our services is with regard to suspected cruelty cases. If an Inspector visits an animal and is concerned that its welfare needs are not being met, they will often require the opinion of an experienced Vet to confirm the best course of action. As you will imagine, this can be difficult and harrowing work. We are often required to treat and rehabilitate these cases and we are also required to act as expert witnesses and to state our opinion in court, should the RSPCA decide to proceed with a prosecution. While clearly a troubling part of the job, this work can be amongst the most important that we perform.
This week is national RSPCA week and the RSPCA has released figures showing that nationally the number of convictions for animal cruelty has risen over 15% in the last year. The RSPCA receive no public funding whatsoever and are entirely dependent on charitable donations to carry out their vital work.
Circus Animals
After a very long period of consultation and a huge amount of lobbying by the Veterinary profession, it has been announced that the use of wild animals in travelling circuses will soon be banned.
The proposals to ban the use of wild animals in travelling circuses in England were published this week and will come into effect on 1 December 2015.
It has been argued by the Veterinary profession that there is no place in today’s society for wild animals to be used for our entertainment. The draft Bill will make it illegal to use wild animals in circus performances.
Vets have been of the opinion that the welfare needs of non-domesticated, wild animals cannot be met within the environment of a travelling circus, especially in terms of accommodation and the ability to express normal behaviour. It is felt that the kind of facilities that can be offered to these animals with the kind of mobile set up that a traveling circus entails, cannot serve their needs adequately and is now out of step with the standards that should be expected.
Initially, there was a proposal that there should be a licensing scheme which would have provided better controls but would not have addressed the fundamental issues. Together with the Born Free Foundation, Captive Animals’ Protection Society and the RSPCA, the British Veterinary Society have urged the Government to do all it can to introduce a complete ban as quickly as possible.
Although it only affects a small number of animals – currently there are twenty wild animals performing in two licensed circuses in England – this is an issue that has been increasingly shaped by public opinion and concerns over animal welfare.
Circuses can still put on a fantastic family show without using wild animals but the proposed ban at the end of 2015 still seems a long way off. Vets hope that the public will vote with their feet until then and only support Circuses that do not use wild animals as part of their show.
Spring Grass..
Anyone with livestock (or even a garden lawn) will tell you that there is not much sign of grass growth yet. This is causing great problems for farmers who, after a poor summer for grass growth last year, are continuing to have to use the last scraps of their fodder crops while they wait for the first of the grass to appear.
There is also a concern that when the grass does start to grow, it is likely to come in a rapid flush and this too can be associated with problems for grazing animals.
Cattle will generally only eat a certain mass of food in a day. The spring grass is lush and juicy but contains a very high percentage of water. This means that when cows ingest the lush grass, they consume a large amount of fluid but the amounts of solids actually decrease.
When we consider the solid component of a foodstuff versus the water content we talk about the dry matter content of the feed and in the spring, this is at an all-time low.
While the spring grass may be very tasty when lush and green, its low dry matter content leads to exceptionally low mineral contents. As a result of the low mineral ingestion levels, the blood concentration of these minerals can drop. When blood magnesium levels drop, we see a condition called “Grass Staggers”. The low magnesium levels affect the ability of the cow’s muscles to contract and so the cow is unable to stand and presents as a “downer cow” in other words a cow who is collapsed. If it is untreated, eventually the respiratory and cardiac muscles are affected and the cow will die.
We can see cows with staggers at any time but it is especially common in Spring. Although it is potentially fatal, it can be treated. We can administer a solution containing a high concentration of magnesium and we often see a very speedy response with the cow breathing more easily within a very short time of administration of the magnesium. Within an hour or so, a cow that looked to be on the point of death, can be up and about as if nothing has happened!
BSAVA Congress
Last week saw the largest event in the diary of the Veterinary Industry with the annual British Small Animal Veterinary Congress in Birmingham. A trip to Congress has become a tradition that I look forward to each year.
Considering the relatively small size of the UK Veterinary industry, with practicing Vets in the whole of the UK totalling only about 18,000, it always amazes me to see the scale of the congress event.
Held over 4 days, Congress attracts around 8,500 delegates. Congress takes over the whole of the International Convention Centre (ICC) in Birmingham where over 300 lectures are held over the 4 days with lectures from key opinion leaders from across the world on all manner of clinical topics. It is essential that Vets maintain their knowledge to keep up with the rapidly changing clinical environment. With new medicines, equipment and thinking emerging all the time, congress is a vital source of information for the profession.
Lectures this year covered a huge range of topics of clinical relevance for Vets and Nurses. This year’s hot topics included a series of lectures on innovative techniques in fracture repair as well as new implants that have been developed for elbow replacement surgery.
There are a number of new treatment regimens for treating heart disease in dogs that rely on early diagnosis and so there were a number of interesting lectures on identifying dogs with heart problems early.
In addition to the lecture based scientific program, there is also a commercial exhibition which is held in the National Indoor Arena (NIA) which is next door to the ICC. A covered walkway links the ICC and the NIA and delegates tend to visit the exhibition between lectures and at lunch time. The commercial exhibition comprises over 300 stands where suppliers to the veterinary industry promote their wares. Everything from the latest laboratory and surgical equipment, to medicines, pet food, computer systems and X-ray machines are on display.
In the exhibition, I was particularly interested in equipment for key hole surgery. There have been a number of manufacturers who have developed new surgical equipment to allow minimally invasive surgery. This is an area of surgery that I am particularly interested in progressing. The equipment required to perform that type of surgery is a huge investment and Congress is a fantastic environment to compare different suppliers equipment and make important purchasing decisions.
Congress also has a very active social program with old friends meeting up each year to catch up. In the evening, it feels as though every hotel lobby and every bar in Birmingham is packed with Vets discussing their Practice and reminiscing with old University friends.
The Veterinary industry is a very friendly industry and Congress epitomises the profession with a tradition of mixing progressive clinical thinking, state of the art equipment and friendly camaraderie.
I am already looking forward to next year’s Congress.
What a difference a week makes…….
Last week, we were in the depths of drifting snow and blizzards. This week, the air is still cold but the clocks have gone forward and there is some blue sky and watery sunshine. Surely spring is round the corner now.
After 10 days with our buildings jam packed with sheep and lambs while the snow fell and the winds blew, suddenly there is light at the end of the tunnel. Easter Sunday saw an improvement in the weather and a big push at the Paterson household to get the sheep and lambs outside.
At a couple of days old, and while their neurological systems are too immature to convey pain messages, a band is put on their tails to remove most of the tail. This is essential to keep their bottoms clean in the summer when flies and maggots can be a real danger. The males are castrated so that they can continue to run with their female siblings as they get older.
We like to keep them in for a couple of days to make sure that the ewe has sufficient milk and to ensure that they ewe and lamb form a close bond but this year they have had to stay in longer than anticipated because the weather has been so bad. There is always the concern that infection may accumulate while lambs are kept in. Maintaining sufficient air circulation in a building when lots of ewes and lambs are housed is always a problem. We have had to ensure that they have had lots of fresh bedding several times a day to minimise the risk.
The last job before turning them out was to number lambs to make sure that we can keep track of which lamb belongs to which ewe. This is obviously very important if they were to get separated in the next few days. Because all our sheep are pedigree, it is also important that we can register each lamb knowing its parentage. When the lambs get larger, they will have an electronic tag fitted to their ear but for the time being, we spray numbers on their flanks and carefully record each number alongside the mother’s details.
Then we took them, one by one, out to the field to let them pair up. It is amazing to see the ewe and lamb calling to each other and then run towards each other and, although the grass is still pretty grey and lifeless, the sight of lambs springing around in the field as they get their first opportunity to run around can’t help but make you feel optimistic that winter is now behind us.
