WELCOME… to St David’s Farm Veterinary Practice, offering help and information to farming clients both new and prospective. Here you will find a little information on our history, our aspirations for the future, meet our team of dedicated vets, be asked for your input – and much more.

Just a Little History….

The original St David’s Practice was one of the oldest - and largest - practices in the Exeter area. The practice has undergone many changes starting with the simple separation of the small and large animal practices in 1997 and culminating in the formation of St David’s Farm Practice Ltd in 2004, when the Equine and Poultry divisions also became stand-alone businesses.

The division into separate and smaller entities became an obvious necessity as we became more and more involved in spearheading the change from traditional “fire-brigade medicine” to the more modern and much more effective preventative approach. As the need grew in modern farming for increased and improved disease control and prevention, so we realised that the modern veterinary practice needed to provide specialised services. Sending a non-specialist farm vet on an emergency call to a sick, high-production Holstein heifer suddenly seemed unsatisfactory to both vet and client.

Our Role in the Farming Community Today…..

Farm Practice is now made up of 5 vets and two consultants – click on “The Team” above to be introduced! - and has recently established bases in Bridgwater and South Hams, thus extending the cover provided by our main branch near Exeter. We concentrate on giving our client-farmers the best possible personal service and believe that:

·     Prevention is definitely better than cure. We work closely with our farmers to put in place good farm protocols aimed at reducing and preventing disease.

·  Long-standing problems (e.g. high cell counts, fertility problems) can and should be solved, not simply suffered, and we are dedicated in our efforts to overcome such challenges.

·   Personal service is key. Each of our farmers has his/her own designated vet who will, wherever possible, be the vet who responds to calls for help. Farmers are given their vet’s mobile numbers – and are encouraged to use them. It is our experience that this provides much-needed continuity of treatment in long-running cases, builds trust on both sides and enables our vets to become familiar with the livestock he/she is treating.

· Education definitely helps. We run regular – and very popular – social/educational meetings where we combine a drink and a bite to eat with talks on various subjects such as “The Importance of Colostrum” and “Nutrition in the Dry Period”. These talks are circularised to clients who have a special interest in them and are also advertised on the web-site – click on “News” above. Our regular Newsletter also carries informative articles and the latest copy can also be found in the “News” section, with old copies being sourced in the same section under “Archive”.

·   Relaxation is a must!! We hold regular social get-togethers for our clients – look out for the Notices posted in our “News” section.

And a Bright Future….

Our overall aim is to provide a full and complete service to our clients. ….The following is just a beginning:

• We have recently formed links with Three Counties Feeds Ltd - a specialist feeding company with trained, experienced and knowledgeable nutritionists whose results speak for themselves. We run internal meetings for staff from both sides, sharing knowledge and news and we have found that this helps to expand our nutrition knowledge. In return we provide them with veterinary back-up as and when required.

• We already use Interherd – the software package which enables us to review our farms’ records at the touch of a button. This is a priceless tool which is able to highlight trends and identify future problems before they become established – it really is invaluable when planning for the future of your farm. We have recently launched a monthly reporting service, aimed at improving fertility and somatic cell counts - and the opportunities are endless. With the input of the correct data, we could do the same for lameness, production, milk quality etc.

In summary, our objective is to support our farmers in their ambition to improve their profitability in any way that we can. We have indeed travelled a long way from the days of fire-brigade vetting – and we look forward to our continuing journey into a better and brighter farming future.

24 hr Emergency Line:           01392 876622  -  press 0 immediately upon connection

Please use the contact form for questions or comments about this web site.
Copyright © 2008 St David's Farm & Equine Practice
Last modified: 18/07/08