Farm Gate Vets

01/06/2026

Hope to see lots of you at this event! We’ll be there with the lambing simulator, talking about Animal Health and welfare and our vet Beth will be demonstrating how vets and farmers care for cows feet

Count down is on?

Preparations are well under way to welcome as many of you as possible.

Not just an opportunity for a fun day out and learn about what we do but also a chance to catch up with friends and family.

Hopefully see you Sunday.

22/05/2026

This week in the practice we have had several reports of blowfly strike, with the warmer weather coming next week this is only going to get worse.
It’s worth keeping an eye on the new SCOPS blowfly forecast which works in a similar way to the nematodirus one. Unsurprisingly our area is currently showing high risk

https://www.scops.org.uk/forecasts/blowfly-forecast/

Please talk to us about control.

21/05/2026

What a fantastic day we had with the Saunders Family at Maidenlands Pedigree Livestock, two interesting talks topped off with a trip to the cows and a super lunch from Ulverston Auction Cafe. Thank you to Dean and all the family for having us and for all the pressure washing! Thank you to Smaxtec for talking about the management boluses used at Maidenlands and for kindly sponsoring lunch. Thank you to Tynedale for supporting us as always. Tynedale farm services, Ulverston smaXtec animal care

21/05/2026

Bank Holiday Weekend Open Hours. Please make sure you have all your essential medicines before weekend.

18/05/2026

Good luck Karen! Today we marked the end of an era as this lovely lady hung up her calculator for retirement. Karen joined Farm Gate soon after we formed as assistant practice manager and soon became an essential cog in our operation with everything accounting and financial. One of her greatest achievements was coping with Jim, as they shared an office for all those years (Karen’s words!). We will miss you keeping us on the right track but most of all we’ll miss your sense of humour- which was needed pretty much daily! From all of the team, we wish you a very long, enjoyable and well deserved retirement, and most of all, thank you.

18/05/2026

Last orders today please! We hope you can join us on Thursday, all welcome 🤗

15/05/2026

Jim, Fiona and Linda have been down at Leahurst (Liverpool Vet School) today with our Farm Vet Network Colleagues, inspiring future vets to work in the beautiful Northwest. This time last year Fiona was a year 5 student at the careers fair so it was a trip down memory lane for her, and proof that survival of your first year in practice is possible!

13/05/2026

Lambs with mucky backsides created a lot of discussion at Sheep Club last night! Thank you to all of you who came along, for your company, questions and chat.

We heard from Alex on how Cocci is carried by the ewes and multiplied by the lambs with the ability to over winter on pasture. Immunity developed being key to control.

Matt Colston from Elanco talked worms, making us think about pasture management- (how worms were managed before wormers were even available), monitoring and selective worming based on daily live weight gains.

Jim covered trace elements, cobalt in particular and how a very small percentage gets absorbed through the gut, which is why injectable forms are his go to.

Huge thanks to Elanco for sponsoring a lovely supper made by Liz Clarke.

12/05/2026

Blue Tongue Awareness- Although theoretically possible to physically cover your cows head to toe in midge nets (as demonstrated by Rebekah!), it’s probably not the most practical solution! Therefore, the next best solution is to metaphorically cover them with vaccine.
Unfortunately, Bluetongue virus did cause us some issues last year on farms that didn’t vaccinate, mainly in the form of dummy calves; and as much as we would like to say it hasn’t hung around, I think that would be wishful thinking. For those of you who did vaccinate, it has not been established how long you get cover for, so for now our recommendation is to do it annually with the one injection.
Cattle that haven’t previously been vaccinated will need two injections 3 weeks apart and won’t be fully protected for another 3 weeks after that; and considering some farmers are already reporting seeing midges on their farms, I wouldn’t delay in getting this vaccine into them.