Matt Evans, from Isabelle Vets, will be coming to Sark once a month to help animals such as Fiona Nightingale’s Gozo. (0776180)

SARK’S livestock – everything from ferrets to farm horses and even Ann Rive’s tortoise – have a new vet to look after their medical needs. Matt Evans, from Guernsey’s Isabelle Vets practice, has taken over from David Chamberlain, who has tended the island’s animals for the past 16 years.

Mr Evans trained in New Zealand and then worked for a couple of years in a mixed practice in the Hawke’s Bay wine region. Whether that qualifies him to become an authority on Sark’s biggest export – empty bottles – remains to be seen.

Although Sark has long had a permanent resident doctor, caring for animals presents more of a problem because clearly there is insufficient demand to warrant a permanent presence. That’s where the Nicolle family come in because for more than 20 years the well-known occupants of the Rendezvous in The Avenue have provided the link between Sark’s sick or injured animals and qualified help.

I can recall not long after arriving here wondering what was going on as I saw Mr Nicolle trying to keep his feet in a howling gale with a horse’s lower leg in one hand and a mobile phone in the other.

As I established later, the horse was injured and Gavin was taking instructions from Mr Chamberlain regarding the best course of action. I still see that particular horse so their combined efforts must have worked.

Mr Evans will continue Mr Chamberlain’s long-established routine and come to Sark on the first Wednesday of every month. He will be picked up from the early morning boat by Mr Nicolle and taken first to farm and home visits before seeing to appointments at the surgery at La Seigneurie.

I’m told that some procedures can be carried out in Sark but more complex matters are referred to the surgery in Guernsey.

Between visits the seemingly indefatigable Mr Nicolle does what he can (no doubt with the mobile phone close to hand) while his mother Anita – she bakes much of the bread eaten in Sark – takes telephone bookings for the next round of appointments and her home is also the distribution point for prescribed medication.

I mention all this because I know from the emails I get from readers who’ve never been to Sark how interested they are in how we cope with situations other larger communities take for granted.

On what the Nicolle family does in this respect I could probably write a book.

Last week Sark’s Emergency Services Committee held a seminar, one of the purposes of which appeared to me to try to establish what sort of resident expertise we have in the island in the event of a major emergency.

All things are relative and, as committee chairman Helen Plummer explained, such incidents need not be major catastrophes for the emergency services to ask for help.

The expertise – in some ways assistance might be a better word – the committee is looking for includes things as diverse as medical knowledge and child-minding services, the provision of sleeping bags and knowledge of wind and tidal conditions.

What impresses me about exercises like this is that while everyone hopes the ‘real thing’ will never happen, there is nothing like being prepared and I applaud Conseiller Plummer and everyone else who had an input into the seminar. It’s the sort of thing that small communities do so well.

Sark’s Carnival Committee is looking for sponsors for the annual sheep race meeting, which isn’t that far away. If anyone in Guernsey (or elsewhere, for that matter) is feeling particularly generous and would like some extremely favourable publicity for them or their businesses, then they could do worse that shell out £150 for a race or £25 for a sheep for this worthy cause. Committee chairman Puffin Taylour is the person to contact on 07781 432 717 and she’ll be delighted to take your money.

* The email address for comment is fallesark@sark.net.