Livestock Worker CV Examples & Writing Guide

This sample is for a stockperson with nine years on beef farms who now runs a herd section on his own. The name and the farms are invented. If you work with pigs, sheep, dairy or poultry, keep the structure and change the species, the numbers and the assurance scheme.

You are usually being read by the farmer, a herd manager or a unit manager. Nobody is scoring your writing. They want to know what they can hand you on day one.

• Species and scale. Suckler beef, beef finishing, dairy, pigs, sheep, goats or poultry, with the head count. Each is a different job.
• What you can do alone. Calve a heifer, give an injection correctly, run the crush, read a feed trough, drive a tractor, fix a fence. List the tasks, not the responsibilities.
• Machinery. Tractor and horsepower range, skid steer, telehandler, diet feeder, ATV, and whether you can tow a livestock trailer. Machinery operators are always short.
• Assurance and animal handling. Red Tractor (Beef and Lamb, Dairy or Pigs), RSPCA Assured, responsible use of medicines training. These show you know why the injection site and the withdrawal period matter.
• Reliability and hours. Calving, lambing, farrowing, milking and harvest do not respect a rota. Say you have worked nights, weekends and 6-day weeks, because that is what is being asked.

“Tell me the head count, whether you have calved on your own at 2 am, and what you can drive. That is the whole screen. A page of words about being hardworking and passionate about animals gets set aside.”

Most people searching for this job land on generic farm worker templates. The fix is simple: name the work your species actually involves.

• Suckler beef and hill farms: calving, tagging and cattle passports, rotational grazing, minerals, fencing, water, gathering and sorting, weaning weights, bull turnout, pregnancy scanning and TB testing with the vet.
• Beef finishing units: checking pens, picking out and treating, reading troughs and setting feed, processing new arrivals, hospital pens, loading for the abattoir, mortality and treatment rates.
• Dairy: milking routine and parlour type (herringbone, rotary, robots), pre- and post-dip routine, somatic cell count, cow flow, fresh cow checks, breeding and heat detection, foot trimming, records in your herd software.
• Pigs: farrowing, processing piglets, weaning groups, feed and water line checks, ventilation and temperature curves, all-in all-out and shower-in biosecurity, Red Tractor Pigs or RSPCA Assured standards.
• Sheep and goats: lambing and kidding, tailing, foot care, shearing support, worming and faecal egg counts, rotational grazing, gathering with dogs and fox control.
• Poultry: house walking and mortality pickup, feed and water line management, ventilation and litter, catching teams and load-out, flock records and biosecurity.

Two or three lines. Species, head count, the jobs you do alone, machinery, one certificate. Use a career objective only if you have no farm work yet.

Farm CVs usually list chores with no scale. Add the head count, the season, the machinery or the result and the same chore becomes proof.

Group animal skills, machinery and the practical facts. Twelve to fifteen items.

• Animal handling: calving, lambing or farrowing, sorting and loading, low-stress handling, crush and race work, tagging, castration within the legal age limits, foot care, treating sick animals under the vet's protocol
• Feeding and nutrition: ration sheets, diet feeder, reading troughs, dry matter adjustment, mineral programmes, grazing rotation, water systems
• Records and compliance: herd software, medicine and withdrawal records, cattle passports and movement reporting, breeding records, biosecurity, fallen stock, assurance standards

Then the machinery and practical side, which is often what decides the hire:

• Tractor (state the horsepower range), skid steer, telehandler, diet feeder, ATV and UTV, and a working sheepdog if you have one
• Silage, hay and bale handling, scraping out and bedding, handling system repair, basic welding and hydraulics
• Full B+E licence, clean record, reversing a livestock trailer; C+E if you drive a livestock lorry
• Availability for calving, lambing, farrowing or milking shifts, weekends, early mornings and 6-day weeks
• A second language, or English as a second language, which matters on many larger units

No licence is required to work with livestock in the UK, but a few courses are widely recognised and cost little. They tell a manager you have been trained in handling and medicine use rather than picking it up by watching.

• Responsible use of veterinary medicines training. Red Tractor farms generally need at least one trained person on the unit, so put the course and year on it.
• Assurance experience: Red Tractor Beef and Lamb, Dairy or Pigs, and RSPCA Assured. Say which schemes your farms were audited under and that you kept the records.
• Animal transport. To move animals by road in connection with an economic activity on journeys over 65 km you generally need a Certificate of Competence for the species, with a long-journey version for journeys over 8 hours. Name the species and journey type on yours.
• Sheep work: shearing courses (British Wool runs them), lambing courses and foot trimming training.
• DIY AI course, usually a few days through a breeding company. It moves you up on any breeding herd.
• C+E licence with a Driver CPC card if you drive a cattle lorry, and PA1 plus PA6 or PA2 if you spray grassland.
• Emergency First Aid at Work, Lantra ATV (quad bike) training, and any low-stress handling or stockmanship course you attended.
• Young Farmers' Club counts if you are early in your career. Say the years, the stock you showed and any stock judging.

Farms take on new starters every spring, especially for calving and lambing. They are checking whether you will handle early mornings, cold, mud and 6-day weeks, and whether you are calm around animals.

• Lead with availability and physical readiness: early mornings, weekends, nights at calving or lambing, lifting 25 kg sacks, working outside in any weather.
• Count Young Farmers', a family farm, showing animals, a neighbour's farm where you helped at lambing, or a horse you kept yourself. Say the species and the number of head.
• Count any machinery time: mowing, tractor work, skid steer, grounds maintenance machinery, or a lorry. Machinery ability shortens your training a lot.
• Count other outdoor physical work: construction, roofing, landscaping, forestry, warehouse. Say the hours and conditions.
• Book a short responsible use of medicines course or a Lantra ATV course before you apply if you are going to cattle or sheep work. Both are inexpensive and put a real certificate on an otherwise empty page.
• Say whether you have transport and whether you can live on site. Many livestock jobs come with a cottage or a caravan and expect someone nearby at calving and lambing.

• One page. Farm and unit managers read on a phone, often standing in a shed.
• Reverse chronological, plain headings, no photo, no date of birth, no marital status. CV templates written for visa applications abroad often include passport details; leave them off, and just add one line on your right to work in the UK if it is relevant.
• Put species, head count and machinery in the first four lines.
• Mirror the advert: "livestock", "stockperson", "suckler", "calving", "lambing", "herd health", "AI", "fencing", "tractor", "telehandler", "Red Tractor", "TB testing".
• If the job includes housing, say you are able to live on site. If it is seasonal, say which months you are available.
• Give a mobile number and expect a call rather than an email. Most of these jobs are filled by phone within a couple of days.
• Line up two references who have seen you work stock: a previous manager, a vet or a neighbour whose cattle or sheep you helped with.