The Veterinarian and the A.I. Industry

Introduction

Abstract

We have placed the A.I. topic in a place of prominance this morning because we are virtually in the cradle here in Wisconsin, Illinois and the Midwest where A.I. was started on a large scale. I suppose people from the northeast would say that it started there and the people from Ontario would say likewise. I guess one of the first places that really promoted dairy A.I. was Clinton, New Jersey. We think that the topic is very valuable to practitioners and perhaps we as a bovine practitioners organization have not given enough thought to the A.I. industry and its interrelationship to the practicing veterinarian. It is quite obvious that we all have been directly or indirectly involved with A.I. organizations or herds using A.I. and, consequently, most of us have gone through the experience of being confronted with problems of A.I. and frustrated perhaps as to our role in working with AI organizations and the A.I. problems that occur between the technician and the veterinarian. We felt that it needed a good airing and a thorough discussion this morning. For this reason we have been fortunate in obtaining a group of speakers that will form a panel here and discuss this. We are fortunate in obtaining them because of their long years of experience. This is a group of veterinarians that not only took note many years ago of what was happening in A.I., but they jumped right into it and they did not have any hesitation that this was a very important role for the veterinarian to be involved in full time and I can see the reason for this because I have personally been involved in the A.I. industry since its start on a large scale.