USDAA Salutes Veterinarians -- and Veterans: Ashleigh Fann, DVM

Vet serves people and animals internationally.

Ashleigh Fann, DVM, is no stranger to traveling around the country with her dogs. The Abilene, Texas, resident is an agility competitor across multiple organizations, a mobile practitioner for emergency and critical care services, and a member of the U.S. Army Reserves. Although traveling for work can make it challenging to train and compete, Ashleigh uses her own training equipment at home and has wonderful friends in the community to help when she’s on the road.

Ashleigh started Lifeline Veterinary Relief Services at the end of 2019 and has benefited greatly from controlling her own schedule. “With my own local company, I fill in for doctors who are out for illness, maternity, vacation or just looking to hire an associate and haven’t found the right candidate,” she said. “When I want to attend an event, I simply don’t book any work. I can’t attend regular classes as there are none in Abilene, but when I’m in the Dallas- Fort Worth area, I piggyback onto a class or schedule a private lesson with my trainer there. And when I’m away for military duty, I have people I trust taking care of my dogs in my absence.”

Serving people and animals internationally

After graduating from Oklahoma State University in 2002, Ashleigh practiced in equine health for a short time. Then she joined the Army in 2003, was stationed in Texas, Okinawa (Japan), and North Carolina, and deployed to Iraq in 2004-2005. After leaving active duty for the Reserves in 2010 and deploying to Afghanistan in 2011-2012, she moved back to Texas and began working in emergency services.

“During my military career, I’ve been able to participate in exercises and missions in Thailand, the Philippines, Vietnam, Timor Leste, Papua New Guinea, Micronesia, Alaska, Honduras, Germany and Slovakia,” she said. “My first dog traveled with me while I was on active duty, but my dogs now stay home when I’m away for duty. Next year, I retire from the military with 20 years of service.”

Competing and training – human and canine

Ashleigh also lived in Scotland from 2017 to 2019, where she worked as a medical director for an emergency services practice and competed in U.K. Agility. When she started with U.K. Agility, Ashleigh had only been competing in the sport for about a year. While in vet school, she had already fallen in love with Border Collies and gotten her first dog. She remembered seeing agility on TV years before and thinking it was cool, but it wasn’t until she got her second Border Collie, Rebel, that she began training.

“I’ve never had a relationship with a dog like this sport allows us to have,” Ashleigh said of the now-8-year-old Rebel. “There’s just something about that partnership, level of communication and coming together as a team while doing something fun and challenging. I’m still relatively new to the sport, having only competed with one dog so far, but my new 1-year-old puppy, Birdie, is learning all the big things that will help her in the future.”

Ashleigh focuses most of her training on Birdie, who she says is still a ways from competition, while she and Rebel tweak the little things and enjoy their partnership in classes and seminars. She also enjoys participating in Ironman triathlon and marathon running (although she no longer competes in these events), as well as long-distance backpacking, scuba diving and underwater photography.