Nick King photo

Darren Loula, left, and fiancee Katie Waddington prepare outside Jesse Hall for commencement exercises yesterday for the College of Veterinary Medicine at the University of Missouri. Loula is going into large-animal veterinary medicine, and Waddington plans for a career in small-animal medicine.

When Darren Loula and Katie Waddington met in a Pre-Vet Freshman Interest Group at the University of Missouri, the city girl interested in small animals and the country boy who worked with farm animals had little in common, and their paths seemed divergent.

But yesterday the couple graduated from the College of Veterinary Medicine, and soon they’ll be taking jobs together near Springfield.

"We’re lucky. We’re in a state with a larger rural population than most of the country," said Jeff Tyler, a professor of food animal medicine at the vet school. "Within an hour drive of Columbia, Missouri, reside one half-million cows."

Tyler said large-animal veterinarians usually have to live close to farmers, but in Missouri, vets can still live in sizable cities where mixed practices serve pet owners as well as outlying livestock producers.

So when Loula and Waddington became engaged, they weren’t too concerned about finding a place where both could practice their specialty.

Nonetheless, large-animal and mixed veterinary practices are disappearing across the country, and demand for large-animal and food-animal veterinarians is higher than ever.

"You have to consider a large part of our mission is food supply," said John Dodam, dean of MU’s vet school. "With such a small percentage of our population devoted to production agriculture, we’re to the point where we need to recruit people to production agriculture."

Dodam said with less than 1 percent of the U.S. population from farming backgrounds, most of the 800 applicants to be among the 65 veterinarians who graduated yesterday are from urban backgrounds.

"More students are coming from urban and suburban backgrounds without exposure or experience in the large-animal side of veterinarian medicine," added Jimi Cook, an associate professor in small-animal orthopedics. Cook said in an e-mail that most of the cutting-edge practices learned at vet school focus on the small-animal practice, meaning there is less likelihood a student will pursue large-animal or food-animal medicine.

Waddington and Loula echoed that sentiment.

"I grew up in St. Louis, which is why I’m going to stick to the animals I know," said Waddington, who will join the Ozark Veterinary Clinic after the couple returns from their honeymoon in July. "My husband - my fiance - he’s been around cows and horses his whole life."

"There was no question as to whether I was going to find a job," said Loula, who believes it’s harder for students from rural areas to compete for limited places in veterinary programs against applicants from cities. Urban applicants often already have college credits and are better educated.

Loula, who grew up in Ozark, originally wanted to raise his own beef cattle herd. After a few summer internships at veterinary clinics in southern Missouri, he saw vet school as a way to continue working with cattle, horses and other livestock even though the work might be harder than it is for a small-animal vet.

"In the end, you see herds of cattle as opposed to 15 appointments at a small-animal clinic," he said. "Large-animal is often a lot more work, longer hours and more physical labor."

But Loula said he wouldn’t have it any other way.

"I guess it kind of works out well in my mind because we share the common interest of veterinary medicine, so we can communicate about that and we can relate to each other pretty well," Loula said of Waddington.

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