Editor’s Note: In their fourth and final year of veterinary school, students are required to complete a series of two-week clinical rotations in the Lloyd Veterinary Medical Center. This article is one in a series that highlights those rotations.
One minute fourth-year students on a College of Veterinary Medicine food animal reproduction clinical rotation were observing a theriogenology specialist treat a bull that was suffering from a breeding injury.
The next they were pulling a calf in another section of the Lloyd Veterinary Medicine Large Animal Hospital.
And this was only day three of the two-week clinical rotation.
During the two weeks, fourth-year veterinary students observe and participate in a variety of activities offered to production animal producers in Iowa State’s Theriogenology Service. Food animal clients include cattle, sheep, goats and swine are treated not only on-site but on farm calls as well.
The livestock are brought to Iowa State for a variety of procedures including bull breeding soundness exams, treatment of bull breeding injuries, cattle pregnancy determination, high risk pregnancy management, small ruminant laparoscopic artificial insemination, and embryo transfer.
April 2026