Watching Time Fly
#bfrdpwy #aginternship #RightRisk
At this point of the internship, I am beginning to realize how fast the time is flying by as I have just completed my fourth week at the ranch. While I have gained a great deal of helpful insight, and learned a lot of useful information, there is still so much I am hoping to experience throughout the next few weeks. I am beginning to comprehend more of not only bovine, but also equine health, and I am excited to continue doing so in the next few weeks. It is impressive how much information and experience can be gained in a matter of just a few weeks!
This week was much like the last week in the kind of work I completed and the day-today activities. Beyond the actual ranch work though, one of my bosses hosted a get-together for the 4th of July and it was a lot of fun. He invited a lot of other people that work for the ranch as well, including people I do not typically see regularly. With this, I realized the amount of helpful connections I have been able to begin developing and I am hopeful that many of these connections could be beneficial in the future as well in regards to veterinary school and/or future job opportunities.
As time passes, I am given more and more tasks and responsibilities on the ranch. I feel as though I can be relied on more because I understand the ways in which the ranch functions on a day-to-day basis and can help out in most areas without help now. For instance, this week I was given the challenge of being responsible for keeping the records of the cattle we doctored, which includes the type of illness, medicine administered, and amounts of medicine given. Along with this, I also can be more involved in the doctoring process, rather than learning from a few feet back as I learn the best methods. Though I have not fully mastered the roping aspect of the job, I can tie down the steers, doctor them, and mark them successfully. This is also very helpful because as I write down the records I am able to somewhat visualize the illnesses as they relate to the type of medicine and the dosages.
Another moment from this week that was something I had only learned about from a conceptual perspective, but had not experienced, was an abscess. This week there were a multitude of abscesses that had to be doctored. This was a great learning experience for me as abscesses are a fairly common issue and I will likely deal with it often throughout my career path. In regards to the abscesses, I learned the symptoms and the ways in which they might be spotted on cattle. Then, I was able to see firsthand the treatment process which included draining the abscess and administering pain medicine in addition to antibiotics to help with infection.
After reflecting on the experiences from this week, I have plenty of questions headed into the next few weeks. I am interested in learning more about abscesses. Prior to being exposed to some very intense abscesses this week, I had not realized the extent to which they can develop and the impacts they can have on overall cattle health. I want to learn more about the risk factors for abscesses and the common ways in which they can develop. I would also be curious to learn more about how minor abscesses can develop into a much larger problem that could eventually kill the animal.
Another concept I would be interested in learning more about is the differences between large and small ranching operations. For example, for smaller operations, are there different ways that the cattle are checked and treated. Since my host ranch is a large scale operation, we check and doctor cattle on horseback. Additionally, since it would be nearly impossible to doctor every little (minor) problem we see, we doctor the extreme cases of illness and injury. In small scale operations, I would be curious to know if they have a tendency to treat more of the minor illnesses and injuries as it may be more reasonable and attainable.
With the experience gained from this week, I hope to be able to have a greater sense of confidence in regards to doctoring cattle and having a full understanding of how certain illnesses can be treated. As the internship continues I am excited to continue to learn more about the illnesses that cattle can get and how they can be handled, especially now that I am beginning to be able to recognize the best medicine to use and the dosages. Through daily exposure to cattle and horses, I am not as hesitant as I was at the start. While initially, every day I was outside of my comfort zone at some point, I now find myself comfortable in completing daily tasks and feel as though a great deal of growth has been achieved.
As I had mentioned, this week I was able to help out a lot more in the doctoring process as I was more confident being hands-on, pointing out sick cattle, and then further helping tie the steer down and administer medicine. I truly feel like these experiences themselves are already helping me to be more comfortable and confident around large animals (horses included). This sense of confidence will be very useful in my future as I will already be comfortable with the doctoring process and the kinds of behavior to expect from the cattle. While some of this experience can be read about or taught in lectures/classes, the in-person experience is something that cannot be replicated by other methods.
Submitted by: Sydney Thorvaldson
Edits by: GrowinG Internship Team
