MATTHEW WATKINSON 3 LINDFIELD ROAD • HAROLD HILL • ROMFORD • ESSEX • ENGLAND • RM3 9BJ URL: ww.fishsnorkel.com • TEL: 07834 530169 • E-MAIL: matthew@fishsnorkel.com
20th September 2010 The Editor Veterinary Record BMJ Group BMA House Tavistock Square London WC1H 9JR Dear Editor, With regards to the research of Leach et al on farmer’s perceptions about lameness in dairy cattle (VR, September 18, 2010, vol 167, p 462), can I politely ask whether anyone has asked the vets supervising the 222 farms involved why 90 per cent of their clients do not perceive lameness to be a major problem, despite a mean prevalence of 36 per cent? Given that the link between vets and the state of the animals they supervise appears to be of little consequence to most veterinary researchers, I suspect not, but if they have asked I would be extremely interested to find out how the relevant vets have managed to justify such a glowing tribute to their educational impotence. Perhaps they just plum forgot to mention their concerns. Repeatedly. For many years. Or perhaps they are just not all that bothered themselves. Can I also politely ask whether anybody else was surprised that a paper dedicated to solving the fertility problems created by large milk yields (VR, September 18, 2010, vol 167, p 446) completely failed to mention the obvious solution? For those who have not spotted the obvious solution yet, the obvious solution to fertility problems created by large milk yields is, surely, smaller milk yields. I realise it would be impossible to justify future research income if we just accepted such an obvious solution, but Charles Darwin did summarise Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s “law of compensation or balancement of growth” more than 150 years ago (in The Origin of Species), and he did specifically use a milking cow to illustrate the concept: “...if nourishment flows to one part or organ in excess, it rarely flows, at least in excess, to another part; thus it is difficult to get a cow to give much milk and to fatten readily.” That 150 more years of pushing animals to the limits has failed to convince people that, as Garret Hardin once said, “the maximum is not the optimum” is plain for all to see (should they choose to open their eyes), but it would be jolly nice if veterinary researchers and practitioners did decide to accept this fairly obvious reality at some point in the not too distant future. Yours faithfully,