Satnan: Fair veterinarian cares for people, too

Mornings on the Missouri State Fairgrounds, Dr. Taylor Woods is both the easiest and hardest person to find.

The easy part is that he always can be found in a livestock facility, checking up on exhibitors’ animals. The hard part is figuring out which one he is in at any given time.

Woods, the state veterinarian and director of animal health, oversees the veterinary office during the fair, a job he has held for 19 years. That doesn’t include the 10 years he handled the same job in Arkansas.

“I love production agriculture,” Woods said. “I love seeing kids grow these animals and show them. If you go to the sheep barn and watch kids pull out their lambs and that doesn’t tug at your heart, well, then you’re just too far gone.”

Dr. Dana Gillig, of Sedalia, is president of the Missouri Veterinary Medical Association and is the emergency livestock veterinarian for the fair.

“We run around every morning, checking barns, making sure everything is OK,” she said, adding that Woods is “one of those guys (who) cares more about what he is doing for others than he does for himself.”

That brand of dedication led the Missouri Department of Agriculture to dedicate the fairgrounds youth building as the Dr. Taylor Woods Youth Center in a ceremony at the start of this year’s fair.

The building is a little off the beaten path — it is behind the Donnelly Arena, near the equine and cattle barns.

“I appreciate the commissioners and the Department of Agriculture and the governor — they all had a hand in doing this,” Woods said. Dedication day was “amazing. I was, as we from the South like to say, walking in tall cotton.”

Joe Baker, of Dexter, is a district veterinarian for the state who oversees 22 counties; he also is on Woods’ team for the fair, which includes four veterinarians. He was working a rodeo in Sikeston the day of the dedication.

“I really wanted to be there,” Baker said. “That honor is well deserved.”

He said Woods is “wonderful to work with. I have known him a long time, and he ... is good for agriculture. He has the experience to understand what the contestant and their livestock have to offer to the public.”

Woods keeps both the animals and the competitors in mind as he goes about his job during the fair.

“The state fair is all about the best of the best,” he said. “We must hold to things like that. If we don’t, the playing field gets uneven for all of the kids.”

His children showed horses and cattle, and he grew up on a farm in southern Missouri, so he understands what those ag-minded youth are experiencing. He said the key thing youths learn when they raise and show animals is responsibility.

“They have to feed them right, water them right. ... We just went through a stretch of excessive heat; they have to take care of them to get them here,” Woods said.

And once they get “here,” every animal that comes onto the grounds must be examined by Woods or one of his veterinary team.

“All animals must be clean; that is what my job is,” he said.

Gillig said Woods is “so humble, so modest ... He is just so dedicated in what he does.”

Baker said Woods’ “positive nature” shines through every day.

As I spoke with Woods in his office on the fairgrounds, all of those attributes flowed forth, as did a great amount of charm and humor. It’s easy to see why people who work with him are so free with praise.

As we rolled up to his office in a golf cart after taking a photo in front of “his” new building, he said:

“I like animals. But as they told us in veterinary school, these animals belong to somebody, so you better like people, too.”

He makes it easy for them to like him right back.