‘Dream Job’ For Young Vet Moving From Cardiff To North East Wales

Wrexham.com for people living in or visiting the Wrexham area

This article is old - Published: Sunday, Jan 31st, 2016

A Cardiff woman who relocated to rural north-east Wales to pursue a career as a vet has spoken of her delight at landing her ‘dream job’.

Manon Williams, aged 24, who was brought up in the capital city, has been working at Wern Vets in Ruthin since qualifiyng as a fully-fledged veterinary surgeon from the London Veterinary College last August.

Below is a quick ‘Question and Answer’ with Manon, who is one of the vets featuring in the S4C series, Bywyd y Fet, which focuses on Wern Vets, a company serving north east Wales including the Denbighshire, Flintshire and Wrexham areas…

Q: Did you always want to become a vet?
Manon: Well, yes and no really. I did when I was young, but then I wanted to be a pilot and an architect too! But when I was around 14 years old, I decided that I wanted to be a vet. I liked the open air and obviously I liked animals.

Q: How did you start out being involved with animal care before studying to become a vet?
Manon: Before I went to college I used to do a lot of voluntary work, working on a town farm in Barry, working on the reception at my local vets in Cardiff, and going to practise milking cows at a local farm. After I finished at Ysgol Glantaf secondary school, I went on to study at the Royal Veterinary College in London. The course is five years long; the first two years is theory, and during the Spring and Summer holidays, we had to do work experience on farms, for a fortnight or a month at a time, to farm, help with lambing and to get used to the animals. Coming from the city, I had no experience of working with farm animals, so going on the farm and staying with the families was a good experience for me. The next three years was more clinical experience with veterinary companies across the country.

Q: So how did a girl from the capital come to work in rural north east Wales?
Manon: Well, I was offered the job after qualifying from veterinary college, because I had regularly been back and forth to Wern Vets for work experience. I have an auntie and uncle who live in the Ruthin area so I stayed with them, which helped me being able to work here. The fact that I speak Welsh is very important at the Wern, and it’s helped me settle down quickly. In many ways, this is my dream job. I’m very lucky, everyone has been lovely. Every time I go to the local Co-op shop in town, the girl behind the till always says that she’s seen me on the telly! The Wern is a small community, everyone is very friendly and they’ve been very welcoming since I started.

Q: Being a vet looks like a busy profession – how much of your life has your new career taken up?
Manon: A lot of people say that it’s a way of life. It is a nine-to-five job, but it’s not always that simple. You don’t have to give up your whole life, but it does take up a lot of your time. It’s something you accept as part of your career, and like in any career, we just try and do a good job. Everyone gives their all at the Wern, the staff go above and beyond their line of duty, and that certainly creates a camaraderie between us.

The six part documentary series, which is currently running at 8:25pm on Monday evenings highlights the team working at the vet carrying out their work on a daily basis.