Biosecurity and disease management are the 'essential drivers' for economic sheep farming and will be top of the agenda at the Sheep Veterinary Society's Spring conference.

The society, with five hundred members drawn from all sectors of the sheep industry, will hold the in-person conference at Templepatrick, in Northern Ireland, on May 23 to 25.

The programme starts on Monday morning with a workshop covering everything there is to know on liver fluke investigation, diagnostics, and control, then the afternoon session will welcome keynote speaker Tommy Boland from University College Dublin discussing the ‘Challenges and opportunities for pasture-based sheep production’. The first day ends with an update on regional sheep scab control and responsible medicine use.

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The following day will have speakers from all four provinces looking at liver and rumen fluke, border disease, ovine mortality and ewe breeding indexes. A representative from DEARA will be there to discuss the recent identification of Maedi Visna and its implications for sheep flocks in Northern Ireland.

The second afternoon session will be a series of short presentations covering subjects including sheep fertility, colostrum transfer and new test developments. Additionally, Peter Hynes from 'Tackle your feelings' will be doing a session on mental health challenges.

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On Wednesday, delegates will be heading into the Glens of Antrim for a farm visit with the Tweed family, which has been associated with the farmland since 1647 and runs over 3000 ewes over 1600 acres of upland grazing. More recently some of the farm has been used as location for the set of Game of Thrones, a variation on farm diversification.

The conference is open for all vets or industry representatives to attend, and a detailed programme and booking form is available via the SVS website sheepvetsoc.org.uk. The deadline for booking is Monday May 2.