08/31/07 Veterinarians of the future

Each year new veterinarians are being licensed and the majority of them are female who see the future in the small animal practice in an urban community. Doctor Marie Bulgin of the Caine Veterinary Teaching Center in Caldwell says some vets get the satisfaction from dealing with individual pets like dogs and cats. BULGIN "As opposed to a farm lot practice or a dairy cow practice where you treat the herd and you're looking for management changes or nutritional changes or you know sanitary changes that will influence the production in that herd." Bulgin says that the food safety chain is also an important issue with veterinarians who tend to dairy and livestock herds. With Idaho's growing dairy industry there's going to be a demand for veterinarians and many Idaho students realize that. BULGIN "WSU tells us that most of their students that are food animal inclined are Idaho students." Fourth year students in Washington State program come to the Caine center for part of their studies. Each year the Idaho legislature picks up the tuition bill for eleven Idaho students to attend the veterinary classes through WSU. Today's Idaho Ag News Bill Scott