In 2021 veterinary surgeon Sue Salter and stud manager Aoife Osborne combined their services at Osborne Farm, Rathvilly, on the Carlow-Wicklow border, to offer clients a comprehensive in-house reproductive breeding service which sees mares from pre-covering right through to foaling.

They provide their clients with a range of artificial breeding techniques offered on site.

Sue, whose practice is located extremely close to the farm, oversees the veterinary work, while Aoife manages the general care of the horses on the farm.

Aoife and Sue are both business owners; Sue being the founder and principal veterinary surgeon at SES Equine Veterinary Services and Aoife being the owner and manager of Osborne Farm.

Personal service

Throughout the 2021 breeding season they worked together and found that their goals and approaches were extremely similar in that they both wanted to offer breeders a specialised, gold standard, personal service whereby each animal can be assessed and treated as an individual.

Throughout the 2021 breeding season Sue and Aoife combined their experience and helped many breeders achieve pregnancies in their mares.

They quickly gained a reputation together by getting numerous difficult mares in foal via natural service and AI (chilled semen from Ireland, the UK and Europe and frozen semen).

According to Sue the major advantage of this professional partnership is that she is able to carry out her specialised reproduction work on individual client horses at Osborne farm, while Aoife is dedicated to implementing the aftercare, designed to each individual mare, around the clock. Their results last season spoke for themselves; with almost every mare, even those considered to be sub-fertile, tricky, problem mares with difficult breeding histories, going in-foal on the first cycle, even with frozen semen.

“The magic of this working relationship is that I can employ my years of experience as an equine reproduction veterinarian in the breeding industry.” says Sue. “I can advise on management options on the farm and trust that Aoife will get it done by giving all her effort and attention to the after-care protocols indicated. I have great trust and faith in her integrity and her experience.”

“We have gained great feedback from clients who have commented on how they appreciate this individual service. We both ensure to communicate with clients - I provide regular and detailed veterinary follow up while Aoife follows up regarding the general management of the animals we work with on her farm.”

Specialists

Sue is the founding veterinarian of SES Equine Veterinary Services which opened its doors officially at the start of the 2021 breeding season. Already the practice has gained a great reputation by offering a dedicated equine veterinary service focused on stud medicine and reproduction.

Following graduation, Sue travelled to Qatar where she worked with equine reproductive specialists at Al Shaqab’s breeding facility in Doha. On her return home, she joined O’Byrne and Halley’s veterinary equine internship programme at their hospital facility which services Coolmore and other major breeding farms. Here she further developed her interest in breeding work. Following her internship, she completed a breeding season in the UK with world-renowned stud medicine specialist, John Newcombe.

Sue then spent a number of years doing back-to-back breeding seasons between the UK and Australia. During this time she specialised in both thoroughbred stud medicine and sport horse artificial breeding while working with some of Australia’s and the UK’s largest breeding facilities. She has been part of a team of veterinary surgeons who service successful breeding operations including Highclere and Darley in the UK. She has helped to manage breeding programmes for stallions such as Written Tycoon, Zoustar, Cable Bay and Always B Miki.

Research

Sue regularly liaises with reproductive specialists within her community such as Chelsea Burden, Angus McKinnon and James Crabtree who are based in the UK and Australia. She is presently completing further specialised studies and SES Equine Veterinary Services is leading the way with equine reproductive research in Ireland.

Research being completed this breeding season includes a study on prostaglandin use in mares and a trial involving a new ovulating hormone not yet available in Ireland, which supersedes those agents used presently. She hopes this research will contribute to this ovulating agent being available to clients here in Ireland in the future. She also enjoys supporting younger people in the industry and she regularly has students and veterinary colleagues visit her who wish to up-skill and learn, she says of this:

“Veterinary breeding work is not necessarily complex. It is often a methodical process and it requires a consistent attention to detail and clear communication with clients so that they understand each step of the process. A preliminary examination combined with the collection of previous history are simple steps that aid in identifying potential problems early. This methodical approach helps to get mares in foal more quickly.

“My veterinary work is only a small part of a mare’s process to go in foal. Trusting that the farm will follow up on the advice and protocols given is the real key - it’s at least 90% of the process and that’s why I enjoy working with Aoife. She’s very forward thinking and gentle with the horses. Welfare of the visiting animals and her own animals is paramount to her and I really enjoy working with people like this.”

Stud management

Aoife has been involved with horses from a young age and before she finished secondary school she completed her British Horse Society exams to allow her to be a qualified instructor. She then completed a BAgrSc majoring in Food and Agribusiness Management at UCD. After her degree she completed a Teagasc Walsh Fellowship PhD which was jointly funded by Teagasc and the Health and Safety Authority in collaboration with UCD researching ‘Occupational ill health and injury among farmers in Ireland’. She worked as a researcher in IT Carlow and then moved to the role of the FBD lecturer in farm health and safety in UCD, where she was also the school’s coordinator for professional work experience.

In the background, Aoife was building her own equine breeding programme at home on Osborne Farm where her father Gerry has been farming and breeding horses for over 25 years. In 2014 they decided to focus on producing top competition horses. This programme now comprises of a large band of broodmares, five stallions and many younger horses which are kept up to three and four years of age.

In October 2020 Aoife decided to work at home full-time at Osborne Farm (K&A Sport Horses Ltd) where she now runs a successful breeding livery yard with a large number of resident client mares and young stock. Aoife is an advocate for education and research, therefore, she is continually up-skilling and updating facilities to ensure she can provide the best service to her clients. She has invested in all the modern equipment to allow Sue to process, test, analyse and store fresh, chilled and frozen semen, all while providing a safe work environment for visitors, staff and horses.

Breeder

As a breeder herself, Aoife understands the frustrations of having a difficult mare to get in foal. She believes strongly in Sue’s methodology which is fundamental in gaining great pregnancy results and she follows Sue’s guidelines precisely. This teamwork resulted in them having a highly successful season at Osborne Farm in 2021 and for the first year ever all of Aoife’s mares went in foal. Aoife says: “I am so lucky to have an expert equine reproduction vet living on my doorstep and I am delighted that we can offer these services to clients here at Osborne farm.”

“Reflecting on the previous breeding season’s successes plus excellent client feedback; we felt we made a great team together.” says Aoife. “We ended the season with a much sought after clinic to help owners deal with their difficult sub-fertile mares, those who had not gone in foal in 2021. Sue performed an in-depth reproductive examination on each problem mare and used specialised diagnostics to identify problems which she treated accordingly. The clinic helped our clients get a step ahead in preparation for the 2022 breeding season. This year we hope to build on the previous breeding season to help Irish breeders achieve their goals.”