Becoming a wildlife veterinarian
I wanted a veterinarian since I was 6 years old. Being a horse girl, I saw myself as a horse vet, but slowly and surely wildlife medicine and conservation sparked an interest throughout the last couple of years at vet school. As wildlife medicine was not exactly a regular specalisation at my school in Denmark, I began looking for courses at other universities. I found one course that was compatible with my degree - Nordic zoo, wildlife and conservation medicine - and that was the beginning of my wildlife carrier!
The course was held at a small animal park in southern Norway, and after a really interesting lecture on wildlife aneasthesia and chemical capture of nordic wildlife, I forced myself out of my comfort zone and asked the lecturers if there was any possibility of me writing my 6 months / 30 ECTS Master's thesis with them. That was Professor Jon Arnemo and Associated professor Alina Evans. What was supposed to be a small project as a part of my Master's degree turned into a real genuin interest and become my first job, as Professors Arnemo and Evans hired me after I graduated in January 2019.
The last year and a half I have spend working on wildlife projects covering semi-domesticated and wild reindeer, moose, wolves, beavers, wolverines, musk oxes and of course the brown bears! It has been a dream come true, and I love the combination of tough field work in arctic, subarctic and boreal condition followed by statistical analysis of our collected data along with laboratory analysis and studying the latest research to stay current.
I started out in vet school wanting to save animals and that is exactly what I am doing now, on a much bigger scale and working alongside passionate and amazing people. I consider myself very lucky, and look forward to continue on this journey.
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