VETERINARY PRACTICE

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 75, Issue 13, 16 January 1932, Page 20 (Supplement)

VETERINARY PRACTICE

METHODS IN THE COUNTRY KEEPING UP APPEARANCES UNDERSTANDING THE EARNER The worries that beset the farming community when times are hard, cream cheques small and all work unprofitable, are not as a rule given, much thought by the general public. Few city dwellers realise the tremendous dilu culties that can arise on a farm, and are inclined to think that the possession of a few cows and sufficient lanu for grazing ensure the farmer a steady income. One of the few people, apart from the farmers themselves, who really understands the problems < f country life, and knows, often by experience, that weeks of diligent work can be ruined by a flood or a prolonged spell of dry weather, is the veterinary practitioner. Living of necessity in a farming district, and visiting in the course oi his duties every class of holding, from large farms amounting almost to , estates to meagre holdings of one or two acres, the “vet.,” as he is popularly termed, is able to see country life in true perspective. The greater ■ part of his time is spent among farmers; yet although he is with them, . ho is not actually of them, and can appreciate their difficulties accurately without having his sense of proportion dulled by living all the time within the narrow confines of the one holding. Perhaps because he is a travelled man : in places where a trip to town is a . big event, and has not always lived in ; the country, but has been away, somer times abroad, to study, the veterinary practitioner is regarded as something of an oracle, and his opinions, on matters far removed from diseases of animals, are treated with respect by . the farming community. Good Farmers and. Bad The average visitor to a farm finds the place pleasantly novel, if the t weather is line, and undoubtedly dis- ■ tasteful if it happens to ue wet. lu fact, the casual visitor actually knows , nothing of farm life, and forms his impressions, not in comparison with other country places he has seen, but from the interest which the farm arouses in him. The veterinary practitioner, how- - ever, is different. He has visited every farm for miles arounu, knows a well- > run place when he sees one, and is r equally quick to note the signs of [ neglect which may easily result in a diseased herd. In consequence, the conscientious • farmer usually meets the veterinary . practitioner at the gate, and escorts him proudly through a clean yard to a well-washed shed, while the slovenly ■ man, who seems oblivious to the dirt of his backyard, allows his visitor to . wade through a sea of mud unaided, . and, as likely as not, growls a surly ! greeting from where he sits in a de- . cidedly malodorous shed. Although he would never admit it the ; slovenly farmer is asaamed that his > visitor should see his place thus, ami i realises that, although nothing is said. , his professional visitor is not surprised to find that there is an infection in the herd, with the animals living under . dirty conditions. In consequence, the 5 veterinary practitioner often arrives > just as the owner finishes washing a t yard that has probably seen no water > but rain for months past, and the selfconscious farmer, caretuny concealing his massive broom, waits for the approving glance which is always given ; at the sight of a well-kept place. t Efforts to Deceive i There is another side to such little r scenes as these. The farmer may have - spoken for many minutes about the care ho takes with his herd and the pains he is at to keep the yard clean, but seldom is the veterinary pracr titioner deceived. He knows when a ’ hasty clean-up has been made to init press him, who continues to express y amazement that any of his cows should . be infected, the expert often savagely } kicks a tyre of his dusty car anti wonders angrily how orten lie must impress people that disease will always follow dirt. j Much as the average person feels , somehow self-conscious in the presence of a doctor who says so little yet seems to know so much, so the majority of farmers feel ill at ease when the s veterinarian has been called in. Never , was a doctor’s opinion of a patient > more eagerly received than is the exv port’s decision concerning the condi- . tion of some valuable coast. His man- ; Her is strictly professional as he gives the verdict and yet, not being heartj less, he cannot but have a feeling of regret if he has to inform a struggling .. farmer that one of his best cows is s not likely to recover. A Feeling of Importance e f There arc some farmers, fortunately e only a few, who have the same feeling , of importance when the veterinarian is t called in as that experienced by a a certain class of person wnen the services of a doctor are necessary. A sort : of fluttering effort to be impressive, e great care to agree entirely with everyi thing the specialist says, without unI derstanding a word of it, and the fern vent hope that the mud-stained car at t the front gate will be recognised by neighbours, are characteristic of those g people. They mean to do their best, s yet the professional man always sighs y when he is summoned to a farm owned s by one of them, for he knows well before he starts that his discourse on the treatment of the case will be interrupted by the farmer with an inconsequential remark, and that the advice given will be forgotten. If the beast does not immediately recover, the veterinarian will certainly be blamed, and will probably be unpaid. The average farmer, unversed in veterinary medicine and surgery, wonders mightily over the practitioner’s business-like handbag, with its mysterious little cases, which, hold all manner of strange-looklng instruments, and its many bottles of differentcoloured liquids. Practically every farmer has a rough and ready know-

■ lodge of elementary remedies and many, by’ misapplying their little learning, do more harm than good, but all stand in > awe of the practitioner’s skill. The sight of a hypodermic syringe seems to cheer the owner of an ailing beast, and a farmer’s unfailing faith in this instrument was even more firmly rooted by a lucky incident on a hold- ■ ing near Auckland recently. The owner and the veterinarian had walked » over to where a beast was lying sick, I and the latter had ccspatched the 1 farmer to the house fc« not water. l Just as tho farmer returned with his - pail, and while the professional man 1 was holding his unused syringe prior ' to giving an injection, the beast lumbered to its feet unaided, and the j farmer still firmly believes that the ' quick recovery was due ro an injection ■ that was never given. i