Colin Mason

Company: SAC

Colin commenced his veterinary career in a 100% farm animal practice focusing predominantly on large, intensively managed dairy herds. Since that term he has worked as a Veterinary Investigation Officer at three SAC disease surveillance centres (DSC’s). Additionally he now has management responsibilities for the Dumfries DSC and is one of the SAC’s and AHVLA’s species specialists for cattle disease surveillance.

At the Dumfries centre he carries out farm animal disease surveillance, serving an area of high livestock density, at the centre of the Scottish dairy industry. This workload comprises post mortem, laboratory and field investigations of farm animal disease including the investigation of unusual disease outbreaks. He is one of the vets running the Premium Cattle Health Scheme to clients across the UK.

Colin is also involved in dairy research activities through the SAC’s Dairy Research Centre at Crichton Royal Farm. Current and previous research interests focus on evaluating risk factors for lameness in the dairy cow, management of the permanently housed cow, genetic and management systems studies and their effects on cow health and investigations of enteritis in dairy calves.

An increasing amount of Colin’s time is spent on providing consultancy services for production diseases (including mastitis, lameness, nutrition and fertility) to dairy farmers and their vets plus training and CPD courses for vets and farmers.