Memoirs of a Cotswold Vet

by Ivor Smith

  After he qualified Bryan had worked in a large Gloucester farm practice and as a schoolboy I had ‘seen practice’ with him. In his younger days he had been much more than your average local rugby player and I had enjoyed watching him turn out for Gloucester at Kingsholm when I was still a youngster at the Crypt School. Murphy’s law had prevented him getting an England cap. He had been selected to play in the final England trial but a cow kicked him at an inappropriate time; he fractured a collarbone and missed the game. Bryan had travelled from Sussex to join the Dad’s Army of TVIs where he had practised for most of his working life. He is a big chap but he met his match in the Forest of Dean on one occasion.

  A small lady resisted his attempts to enter her farm and the confrontation that followed ended with her chucking a bucket of disinfectant over him. Retaliation was out of the question. This wet episode was not Swansea or Ebbw Vale on a wintry Saturday afternoon. He knew how to deal with assaults down there. That was where you got your retaliation in first, of course.

  Having led an active life I wondered, as I am sure everyone does, how I would adapt to life in retirement. Enjoying the beautiful Gloucestershire countryside without one ear listening out for the telephone was a new experience. Simply wandering around the village was a fresh pleasure, and Sunday mornings could be particularly rewarding and entertaining. It was remarkable to see what the youngsters could do on a steep ramp whilst balanced on a narrow skateboard. Now, simply walking with Coco around the nearby playing fields became very much a social occasion. It was wonderful to have time just to chat with the pet owners I had only talked to across an examination table for years. The vast majority of the owners are responsible folk who take clearing up their dogs’ droppings seriously but there are the arrogant ones who still believe the rules do not apply to them and their dogs. They drove me wild.

  For many fellows, Sunday morning was the time for the weekly game of football, and the players too added something of interest to the Sunday morning walk in the village, and for sheer entertainment value some of the games were second to none. It was not exactly David Beckham standard but the enthusiasm was top class. One morning a football whizzed past the goalpost and landed near where I was watching the match with my dog. While the goalie was having a heated argument with his full-back, Coco nose-dribbled the ball back on to the field of play. The goalie shouted to the full-back to get off the pitch and let the dog take his place as it was a better player than he was. We discreetly moved quickly out of harm’s way and minutes later were at the other end of the field. On this occasion the ball shot cleanly between the other goalie’s legs and his side went hysterical. The goal scorer did not seem to object to the embraces he was getting from some of his forwards and then, after what seemed a ritual ‘give me five’ sort of handshake with everybody, he decided to do a celebratory acrobatic turn. It bore little resemblance to the Premiership double back-flip and land on your feet sort of thing. Nevertheless I was impressed as he took off and did a spectacular diving bellyflop into the mud. While he was in mid-air I prayed he would not land in anything else.

  For the first two or three years it was wonderful to be able to wander over Chosen Hill and enjoy the many other lovely walks in the Cotswolds, naturally at that time always accompanied by Coco. Our daughter, Sally, had moved to Derbyshire so the opportunity to walk in the Peak District as well arose. With the added pleasure of the company of her new chocolate Labrador pal Bramble, we roamed for endless miles. But nothing lasts for ever and eventually the ever-youthful Coco began to show signs of her age catching up with her.

  One weekend Angela was spending a few days with Sally when there was a sudden and unexpected deterioration in Coco’s health. Her kidney function had gradually started to fail but for the last year I had managed to control it well and she enjoyed a happy and active life. Things were clearly not right on the Saturday morning. She was strangely subdued and was content to sleep for most of the day, only venturing into the garden when I went out for a stroll. Stopping for a quick drink at the pond was normal behaviour for her, but on this occasion she stopped and lapped and gave the impression she did not really know what she wanted to do. I took a small blood sample from her and ran through the same kidney function tests that I had regularly monitored. I was astounded by the deterioration. Poor Coco was developing the acute phase of renal failure. It was time for intensive care and a great deal of fluid therapy and medication to reverse what was happening, and with this immense effort, stress and confusion to her there was a strong likelihood that there would be more of the same for her within days. In my heart I knew we were approaching the end of the road.

  I was up early Sunday morning. The morning sun after the overnight frosts in February are too good to miss, but I suppose the real reason was to check on the dear old dog. She looked up as I opened the door of the utility and her weak tail attempted a wag. She struggled to follow me as I walked slowly up the garden. Already she seemed to be in another world. I carried her back into the house where she slept for a few hours. The routine was repeated in the afternoon but this time, when I turned to walk back to the house, she did not follow me. I left her on the lawn and watched her behaviour with interest. Her head rose and she sniffed the air. She appeared contented and slowly began to make her way back. Bravely she carefully descended a few stone steps that led to the garden pond. She stopped and attempted to reach forward to drink. Her forelimbs were too weak to support her and she stumbled and struggled to avoid falling into the water. She was losing her dignity, albeit in the secluded garden that she loved. I was choked and could watch no more, and I carried her into the house for the last time.

  It was the middle of the afternoon and I had made the decision. I telephoned Angela and in a shaky voice broke the news to her. She asked if I wanted her to return straight away but, the decision made, I wanted to do the necessary as quickly as possible. Still in some way I wanted Angela to be there at the end of Coco’s life. She listened sadly to my intentions which she knew I would carry out. At 5 o’clock Angela was aware that I was giving our dog a heavy sedative injection, and probably she could envisage me lifting her on to the kitchen counter an hour later and giving the final injection. Coco died at 6 o’clock. At first light the next morning I dug her grave in the hard white ground and laid her to rest. Later, I packed a case and drove north to Derbyshire, alone. On arrival it was sad to see Bramble charging around, jumping in and out of our car excitedly searching for his mate, and it was many months before that behaviour pattern was broken.

  We made the move to Derbyshire in the summer of 2007 and now enjoy a quiet relaxing life in beautiful countryside. Well, it is quiet until the granddaughters arrive. But when Angela is engaged with them, nothing gives me greater pleasure than to walk with Bramble in this peaceful area of lanes, fields, peaks and rivers. At these times I often think of all that has happened over the years and the people I still vividly recall.

  Tragically, out of the blue, our close friend John Eggleton suffered a fatal heart attack and died in the summer of 2000. We had looked forward to numerous happy days in retirement together. Many of them would have been spent on the banks of rivers, most of the day perhaps just reminiscing or putting the world to rights, and if we caught fish that would be the usual bonus. The loss of John was shared, among innumerable friends, with another former classmate, Mike Greening. The three of us had fished together as schoolboys and enjoyed each other’s company for almost half a century. At the end of his professional career with the Civil Service, Mike retired and we meet up regularly at Kingsholm. We are still able to spend the occasional day together angling, and you can be certain that at some time during the fishing day one of us will ask, ‘Do you remember that day we went with John to —?’ Neither of us will forget that day, no matter which one it was.

  Julian Pettifer, the son of the principal of my first practice in Crudwell, is still a very active globe-trotting broadcaster cum writer/journalist. His reports from Vietnam won him the BAFTA Reporter
of the Year Award in 1968. Today he occasionally hosts Gardener’s Question Time on Radio 4, a far more sensible occupation than dodging bullets in Vietnam. He is still infuriatingly good looking.

  What happened to Hubert Evans of Crudwell fame? Believe it or not he did die with his boots on, just as Angela’s mother had predicted. However I am sure she did not envisage it happening behind a cow. Poor Taff turned out one night to attend the animal in Ashton Keynes that was having difficulty calving. I can imagine the scenario, and if ever there was a worse place to encounter an obstetrical problem for Hubert this must have been it, in the company of one his most demanding clients. We last had the opportunity to meet up with Taff at a disco held at Cirencester’s Rugby Club. It was several years after we had left his Crudwell practice and we had bumped into each other at a Cotswold Veterinary Surgeons’ Society meeting in Cheltenham. He was very amiable, and being his usual persuasive self, insisted that we should go along. Taff was at his social best at the dance and proudly introduced us to his vet assistants.

  ‘I don’t suppose you knew I had two assistants now, did you?’ He tried very hard to mention this monumental fact in the most casual way possible. Angela’s response was spontaneous and totally out of character. She replied, ‘So you don’t do any work at all now then, Mr Evans?’ He for once was lost for words.

  I was immensely fortunate as a new graduate to have been associated with John Bourne in my first job. I saw a great deal of him in my first year and learned a huge amount from him. He set the benchmark standard, and knowing what was expected of me I quickly gained the confidence to be a good farm animal vet and packed a lot of experience into a short space of time. John had left the practice in Crudwell to take up a teaching and research post at the School of Veterinary Science at Bristol University. He rapidly rose through the academic ranks and in recent years Professor F.J. Bourne has been chairman of the Independent Scientific Group, the ISG, on cattle TB. I am only able to mention in passing the opposing views on how we should be controlling the spread of bovine TB. Everyone is in agreement that the badger is involved in the spread of the disease. The argument in its simplistic form is, what do you do about it?

  The majority of practising vets and most farmers are convinced that culling the badgers is essential to bring bovine TB under control. The ISG concluded that badger culling can make no meaningful contribution to the control of cattle TB in Britain. And now our government’s chief scientific adviser, and £40 million later, has chosen to ignore the years of research and the advice of the ISG, and has recommended a badger cull anyway. Are you confused?

  I enjoyed the company of Mark Hicks-Beach both professionally on the farm and as a true friend, but life can be cruel and often inexplicable. Mark was fifty-five when he died in 1998. His death followed a short but very serious illness and today he still watches over the wonderful historic estate from the ancient cemetery at Witcombe Church.

  Steve Butterworth, the young assistant who joined The Brambles practice in 1988, brought a new dimension of veterinary orthopaedics to the area. A top job opportunity unexpectedly arose in the orthopaedic department at the Bristol Vet School and Steve sadly left Churchdown to take up the prestigious post at the university. He left behind high practice standards, many photographs of his interesting work, and pictures of his upturned car in a Brockworth field. Today he is the principal of one of the UK’s specialist vet orthopaedic referral practices in Swansea.

  There have been so many farmers and pet owners and some ‘I’m not sure actually where you fit in’ type characters that I could write about. I hope I have represented everyone fairly. No? Well, I have done my best and don’t expect everyone to agree.

  Most of my Liverpool Vet School year of 1960 have now of course retired. I regret that it has not been possible to write about each one of them. You would never believe some of the stories anyway. At some time in my life they have all played an important role and I am very lucky to have enjoyed their company in a very special way. Graham, our wonderfully talented and tolerant Stroud chauffeur, has enjoyed a brilliant career working for the government’s Veterinary Services, and at last he has been persuaded to retire. My old flatmates Nigel and Roger have spent most of their professional lives as practice principals in Lancashire practices and are now enjoying a quieter pace of life, some of the time. Between them, they enjoy walking, painting, reading newspapers, wine tasting, beer tasting, golf, watching afternoon television and eating out. They also still enjoy playing the guitar! Who in their right mind would want to be friends with sixty-plus-year-old rockers buying Gibson and Fender guitars? Actually it’s still great fun and occasionally I’m invited to one of their jam sessions. Never thought ‘When I’m Sixty-Four’ would come around so soon. Nigel has recently formed a Rotarians’ Rock Group. Wait for it – they are the ‘Elderly Brothers’.

  Wynn Walters has hung his wellies up at last. He left the Cheltenham practice in 1971 and since then many Wiltshire and Cotswold farmers have enjoyed his company and professionalism. He remains one of our pals at vet gatherings who are still there late in the evening long after the others have retired to bed, happy to reminisce around a log fire. Bonded to most of the youngsters who met by chance at a vet school in 1960 these old friends start to become inseparable from the relatives. Compared to the much larger numbers of students who enter vet school today, we were indeed a very small band starting together, just twenty-nine chaps and six young ladies. How times have changed. The proportion of women entering vet schools today can be in excess of 80 per cent.

  Already we have sadly lost several of the men from natural causes. For different reasons two of the losses I have special reason to mention. A popular chap in our year was Fred Tomusange. He hailed from Uganda and, at thirty-two, was the oldest in the year when we began our course. We enjoyed his company and that of his wife and young children for the five years we spent together in Liverpool. On qualifying he returned to Uganda and we know that he was soon an important member of the Ugandan government’s Agriculture Department, the equivalent of the UK’s DEFRA. Within a few years we lost all contact with Fred and our attempts to track him down were met with unhelpful replies from the Amin administration. None of us are sure but we feel that he may well have been one of the 500,000 Ugandans who mysteriously disappeared when President Idi Amin was in power.

  Considering the academic pressures we were under and living closely in each others’ company for most of the time I think we all got on superbly well together. Naturally for some reason or other we were all down in the dumps at times but together we kept our spirits high. A pint, a chat and a good laugh in the local Brook House pub on Smithdown Road, Liverpool, put everything into its true perspective. We maintained our youthful dignity and sanity, and we survived the course supporting each other. It was not until recent years that we thought perhaps we could have done more to have stopped one of our year from taking his own life. Suicide in our student and young postgraduate days was something so unlikely that nobody – as far as I know – would ever have given it a second thought. There was so much to live for. So how in Heaven’s name can you now account for the veterinary profession being the top of the professional suicide league? The statistics are frightening.

  Numerous suggestions and even scientific papers have been written to explain how this situation has arisen. I suspect we all have our own differing opinions on the reasons for this tragic state of affairs. Regardless, I find it sad that if recent surveys can be believed over half the vets in the profession wish that they had chosen a different career. Where has it all gone so terribly wrong?

  I am pleased I became a vet and have few regrets, and even in retirement I still feel I am one. Today I enjoy the sound of the Veterinary Record dropping through the letterbox and thumbing the pages at the breakfast table, even if the job adverts are of no interest. I have enjoyed my career and I have had the good fortune to meet hundreds of wonderful people and their animals. Some of the clients, in one way or other, produced more th
an their share of good humour and laughter. One such chap was Peter Stubbs, whose family had run the ‘open all hours’ store on Cheltenham Road East in Churchdown.

  Gloucester has been fortunate to retain its four ancient grammar schools despite decades of political pressure to abolish them. The affectionate rivalry between the two boys’ schools is memorable and regularly results in friendly banter at social gatherings. Peter was not an Old Cryptian. He went to the other school, Sir Thomas Rich’s, and he reminded me of it on every occasion I called to fill up with petrol. At the shop you could buy a loaf of bread, a tin of polish and probably the ‘fork ’andles’ or ‘four candles’ as well. However, a ten-minute chat with proprietor Peter was obligatory when we put the world of Gloucester rugby and what was wrong in the village to rights, usually in that order. One afternoon a mutual customer who owned a big Rottweiler cross called into the shop and tied his dog to the handle of a large dustbin. While the customary debate was in progress, the Rotty spied his rival, Rover, on the other side of the main road. Not to be hampered by being tied to a big bin he took off, dragging the noisy missile behind him. Screeching brakes broke up the argument on who should play in the front row.

  It was unfortunate that this should happen at the time of day when traffic was pouring out of the Dowty Rotol factory, and it was just as busy on the Gloucester side of the traffic lights at the Hare & Hounds pub. The sight of the dustbin whizzing along behind a big dog determined to say hello to Rover on the opposite side must have been astonishing. The bewildered owner was confronted with trying to sort out a situation that resembled a scene from Keystone Kops. Whenever he shouted ‘Come’ another collision occurred a few seconds later. There was no serious harm to either of the animals involved and no doubt the dents, scratches and scrapes inflicted on the numerous vehicles that were skidding and swerving and bumping into each other were soon put right.