RED DEER – There were no veterinarians near Grande Prairie, Alta., when Ray Fenton was growing up on the family farm.
Farmers usually called a neighbour with a talent for handling calving problems, trimming feet, castrating horses or draining abscesses on draft horses.
Fenton’s father was one of those individuals, but when his saddle horse died from a foot injury because there was no vet, the young man became convinced there had to be a better way.
He graduated from the Western College of Veterinary Medicine in Saskatoon in 1970 and spent the rest of his career promoting animal welfare.
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His dedication to making life better for livestock was rewarded when the Alberta Farm Animal Care (AFAC) association recently presented him with its award of distinction for his lifelong dedication to animal care. The award also recognized his work forming AFAC in 1992.
Fenton convinced those involved in animal agriculture that an overarching organization dedicated to welfare concerns was needed.
“Ray warned against a head in the sand approach,” said Susan Church, AFAC’s first general manager.
“He was ahead of his time and wise in his understanding of how the industry needed to continually take charge or improving animal care.”
Fenton also worked closely with Pam Miller of Western Stock Growers and Alberta Agriculture veterinarians Terry Church and Ross Gould, and together they guided the organization on its way to becoming one of North America’s most respected farm animal care groups.
He helped develop Alberta’s humane livestock transportation study, one of the first of its kind in North America, and created protocols for the AFAC animal care Alert line and the Alberta Livestock Protection System to help farmers with animals in distress.
Fenton worked in private practice and as a government veterinary.
In 1990, he was named head of Alberta Agriculture’s health management branch and the livestock market inspection program that included animal welfare responsibilities. He also helped write national codes of practice, represented the Canadian Veterinary Medical Association on the review committee for the beef code and chaired the development of the sheep code.
When he retired from Alberta Agriculture, he became AFAC’s on-call veterinarian.
With a long career behind him and more work to be done, he has seen the culture of animal welfare shift, especially in the way livestock is raised, sold and transported.
“I am very impressed with the large animal veterinarians out there. They are all very animal welfare oriented,” he said.
Animal welfare was not part of the curriculum when he was a vet student. Procedures and handling equipment were often crude and awkward.
All that has improved, he added. Equipment is better and pain management is now available.
Producers are also making an effort to be kind while still making a living, but Fenton said areas of improvement remain.
Old school ideas about animal care persist among some as questionable practices are passed down from one generation to the next.
“To some, (animals) are a piece of equipment that earns you money. You are not going to change the mind set of those people,” Fenton said.
Other farms he has visited try to provide proper care but struggle because of crumbling finances, family problems or lack of understanding.
Codes of practice have been written for all livestock and poultry species in the last 20 years, but Fenton is not sure how many producers know they exist.
He said care of unfit and old animals, lameness in dairy cattle and knowing when to put an animal down are serious issues.
Books on humane handling of unfit animals including horses, dairy and beef cows have been published in recent years and are used by producers, the SPCA and RCMP.
“These are welcomed and good educational tools to reflect the regulations as well,” he said.
They show what is meant by unfit rather than leaving it up to the individual’s interpretation.
“If it is undue care, it is not definitive. They are open to interpretation.”
The books show full colour pictures of emaciation, disease, lameness and injuries, explain when animals may or may not be transported and show proper euthanasia techniques.
“People are not quick enough to euthanize these compromised animals.”
Fenton said the problem is often the result of a reluctance to kill something, which he also sees among pet owners who keep a favourite animal around too long even though it is in obvious pain and has poor quality of life. The same happens with defective newborns or animals that are no longer fit and show no chance of recovery.
Fenton said poor management of old animals is another problem.
“(People) view the old and infirm animal as past its prime so they get shoved to the side. They suffer unnecessarily,” he said.
Lameness in dairy cattle living in confinement also needs work, he said.
While Fenton claims he is reducing his workload, he remains as AFAC’s on-call vet and spends months each year travelling to farms around the world to see how they manage.
“Seeing agriculture in other countries is a special interest for me,” he said.
