Your Pet's Friend - Your Veterinarian

Your Pet's Friend - Your Veterinarian

Your Pet's Friend - Your Veterinarian
Reading Level

	edHelper's suggested reading level:	grades 4 to 6
	Flesch-Kincaid grade level:	6.58

Vocabulary

	challenging words:		epidemic, internship, supervise, diagnose, communication, veterinarian, prescribe, medical, properly, assistant, wounds, tests, especially, memorize, might, schools
	content words:		American Veterinary Association, James Herriot, If Only They Could Talk, United States

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Your Pet's Friend - Your Veterinarian
By Colleen Messina

¹     You might want to memorize a simple rhyme if you would like to get a pet. Pets need vets. Your veterinarian can be your pet's best friend...besides you, of course.

²     So how do you find this important friend? You could ask your friends where they take their animals. Local breeders may have good ideas. You can also talk to people at animal shelters. Most states have an association that can also tell you the veterinarians in your town. The American Veterinary Association says that there are more accredited veterinarians than ever before, so you could also contact them to find a qualified veterinarian.

³     The word comes from a Latin word veterinae which means "draught animals." A good veterinarian has a special affinity for animals. You can tell how people feel by how they talk about animals or even how they touch an animal. Unless he is a relative of the famous Dr. Doolittle, a vet has to understand animals without talking to them. Dr. Doolittle learned animal language from his pet parrot. Then, he went to Africa to cure a monkey epidemic. He had wild adventures on his trip. Real vets would love to know animal languages.

⁴     Communication with both animals and people is a big part of a veterinarian's job. He has to be able to talk to pet owners about their pets, and he also needs to be able to understand the body language of animals. If a dog has a hurt his leg trying to jump over the fence, he can't tell the vet that he whacked his paw trying to do a trick. If a gerbil has gas, he can't explain that he ate too many pumpkin seeds to his vet. One famous vet named James Herriot wrote many funny books about his experiences, and one of his books was called If Only They Could Talk.

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