Farm Animal

A selection of our services

Priory Vets has been an integral part of the local farming community for over 85 years.

Our specialist farm team provides the highest quality of medicine with a proactive approach to preventative health planning. Our dedicated large animal premises are equipped with an in-house laboratory, pharmacy and lambing facilities and examination area. The site boasts ample parking space enabling easy access for clients with trailers.

  • Beef
  • Cattle Hoof Health
  • Dairy
  • Sheep
  • Camelids
  • Chickens
  • Vet Tech Services

Beef

Bull Breeding Soundness
Ensuring your bull is in good working order is a crucial part of supporting your overall herd's fertility and establishing a tight calving period.

Bulls may be tested as part of a pre-purchase examination or after a period of rest before the breeding season begins. Making sure your bull is fit for breeding can also save you money when insuring your bull.

Bulls undergo a full clinical examination as well as a semen quality examination.

Fertility
As well as ultrasound scanning your cows for pregnancy and advice on effective synchronisation programmes, our farm vets are available to help with all aspects of fertility, from nutrition, to bull and heifer selection.

Beef Herd Health planning
Through discussion and assessment of current herd management and data, we aim to provide a useful herd health plan to enable your herd to thrive. The plan complies with the requirements outlined by Red tractor and FAWL as well as assessing your antibiotic usage.

By evaluating past performance and planning ahead for the future through we can prevent the risk of diseases to you animals and maximise your farms potential.

Disease Surveillance And Health Schemes
These schemes are carried out in conjunction with specialist veterinary laboratories to certify disease-free herds. Regular samples are taken from a selection of animals in the herd and tested at CHeCS-accredited laboratories. By achieving Certified Health Status, herds will have a higher standard of health, and animals will have added value when sold on for breeding purposes.

Cattle Hoof Health

Proper hoof care is essential for animal welfare and to prevent lameness. Lameness not only causes pain and discomfort to animals but also results in significant financial losses for farmers.


Sulwyn Jenkins and Andrew Tyler are both Level 4 accredited cattle hoof trimmers. Our collaboration between vets and trimmers has led to increased communication and daily discussions about lameness. We also have a team of Vet techs who offer mobility scoring to aid in early identification of lame cows as well as blitz treatments for digital dermatitis.

Together our trimmers, vets and vet techs can make a bespoke plan tailored to the needs of your herd, whatever its size, and ensure that your animals receive the highest level of care.


Prioritise hoof health, and watch your livestock thrive!

Dairy

Routine Fertility Visits
Well managed fertility is one of the main drivers in the profitability of your herd. We offer weekly, fortnightly or monthly fertility visits with a dedicated farm vet to meet your herd's needs. Visits are assisted by ultrasound scanners for early detection of pregnancy or cows with have not shown signs of estrus. We also take time to discuss all aspects of fertility and are able to evaluate key areas of your herd's fertility with the use of Total Vet, Interherd and NMR reports.

Mastitis Investigation
We provide systematic mastitis investigations to effectively establish the cause of your problem through on farm evaluation and data analysis from milk recordings.

On farm evaluation of your milking routine and parlour set up will allow your cows to be milked to their full potential and prevent future complications. The use of our dynamic flow meter will provide an accurate real time measure of flow rate for the individual cows and allow you to confidently assess parlour performance.

Our in-house lab can provide instant levels of somatic cell counts for bulk milk or individual cow samples.

Dairy Herd Health
Our farm vets are committed to providing a proactive approach to health planning and to comply with the requirements of Red Tractor accreditations and other milk buyer standards. By evaluating past performance and planning ahead for the future we can prevent the risk of diseases to your animals and maximise your farm's potential.

Calf Health Package
The "Calf Health Package" was set up as a cost effective way to improve and monitor the health and performance of your calves. The package includes:

  • Initial visit, discussion and plan
  • Blood sample 6 calves for colostral antibodies IgG
  • Demonstration on  how to measure quality of colostrum
  • Scour check calves
  • Fortnightly Vet Tech visits to weigh band calves
  • 4 Vets visits a year to monitor

Nutrition
Priory Vets offer independent nutritional consultancy service which includes rationing and monitoring of performance. An assessment of a herd's metabolic status is a useful way to evaluate whether their feed intakes meet the herd's nutritional demands. Milk recording data through NMR and Interherd can provide an insight into issues such as Ketosis, SARA and LDA's.

Sheep

Lambing
Our large animal premises are equipped with indoor lambing facilities and a surgical area for caesarean sections. The site boasts a large parking area enabling easy access for clients with trailers.

Flock Health Planning
An important part of your flock's performance is based on evaluating past performance and planning for the upcoming year. Advice on vaccinations and worming is important in controlling disease and preventing resistance on your farm. Our flock health plans comply with Red Tractor and FAWL requirements.

Evaluation of antibiotics usage using an antibiotic calculator helps you to benchmark your flock with others farms and identify areas of improvement.

We carry out in-house worm egg counts, and can advise on better targeted treatment options, which offer significant savings on time and wormer costs.

Ram Fertility Testing
Our vets recommend that rams are evaluated for semen quality and breeding soundness before the breeding season. Although it is rare for them to be completely infertile, sub-fertility is a common finding.

Vasectomies can be performed on rams, and by using these rams as teasers, a tighter lambing season can be achieved.

Camelids

Faecal Egg Counting And Worming
Alpacas and llamas are sensitive to many gastrointestinal parasites. It is recommended to have a faecal egg count done on a routine basis (at least twice a year, depending on your farm) to use as a guide for worming. We offer a laboratory service dedicated to camelids to monitor parasite levels and advise about worming treatments and pasture management. Please call us before bringing samples to the practice so that we can advise you on taking samples correctly as this depends on the size of your herd.

Vaccinations
Camelids should be regularly vaccinated against clostridial diseases, which can cause sudden death. Our vets can help you choose the right vaccine and advise about the correct vaccination protocol to make sure all animals are well covered.

Castrations
Male camelids that are not kept for breeding should be castrated from about 18 months of age. We have good facilities to perform castrations at our surgery on Parc Teifi in Cardigan, or we can come to your farm if preferred.

Training Courses
We provide training courses to help small holders to develop all skills to look after alpacas and llamas.

Herd Health Planning
With a herd health plan we can provide written advice specifically tailored to your farm or smallholding. The herd health plan covers all aspects of preventative medicine (management, endo and ecto-parasite control, nutrition, body condition scoring, vaccination and biosecurity) in addition to advice on any specific issues that you might have in your herd.

Chickens

A number of our vets have completed specialist training courses on chickens and are happy to advise on all aspects of chicken health and husbandry.

Vet Tech Services

Nia has a wealth of on-farm experience having lived all her life on dairy farms. She is an accredited and registered mobility scorer as well as being a qualified veterinary nurse.

Services include:

  • Mobility scoring
  • Body condition scoring
  • Blood sampling
  • Weigh banding and calf health monitoring
  • Herd vaccination

The Farm Team

Hannah Addison - Practice Director

Hannah Addison

Hannah Addison Practice Director
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Joost Burki - Clinical Director

Joost Burki

Joost Burki MSc MRCVS Clinical Director
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Mags Jones - TB Administrator

Mags Jones

Mags Jones TB Administrator
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George Jones - Clinical Director

George Jones

George Jones MVDr MRCVS Clinical Director
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