Charles Harding

Charlie is a Shropshire lad born and bred, son of George & Mary Harding formerly of Grange Farm Northwood. It was here that Charlie worked at home helping his parents with the pig unit. Charlie then took working with a G H Bradshaw Livestock Breeders & Dealers of Whitchurch. Here he spent many a happy day tracking round the county collecting livestock.

In 1995 Charlie decided to attend a 4 day Dutch Claw Trimming course at the Willows Vet Practice in Cheshire. From here he then set about trimming cattle for local farmers. In this first year he trimmed 769 cows.

Knowing it would take some time to build his business Charles also worked with locally based Happy Pigs Ltd at Shawbury from 1996 to 2002

Looking to make a living out of cattle foot trimming Charlie then set about researching the market and the availability of crushes that would help him not only become more efficient but would also ensure that animal welfare was not compromised. As a result he was then one of the first trimmers to purchased one of the first hydraulic trimming crates. His investment into the WOPA crate was justified and he quickly started to see an increase his hoof trimming throughput which in turn helped increase his knowledge of cattle claw ailments.

In 1998 he joined the newly formed National Association of Cattle Foot Trimmers and soon became an active member on the committee.

Charlie has continued to grow the business and has help train a number of cattle foot trimmers over the years. Many of which he still works with.

During 2007/2008 Charlie worked with Dr R D Murray of The University of Liverpool to help him complete trials in association with Pfizer, one of the world’s leading pharmaceutical companies, at the cutting-edge of the research and development of medicines for humans and animals. This work resulted in working with both existing local farmers and new farmers out of the county.

Dr Murray is presently writing up the first paper from the work Charlie carried out regarding treating lame cows in conjunction with Pfizers. Charlie is very excited to be noted as one of the authors on the paper.

Charlie doesn’t have a huge amount of spare time, but when he does in the summer he will try to make it down to the bowling green where he can be seen competing for Whixall Bowling Club.