So. I am sawing logs with my trusty chainsaw in the most manly of fashions, with thoughts of the long, cold winter ahead, the heat emanating blissfully from a wood burning stove and how wonderful it feels to provide warmth, comfort and safety for your family.

And then, abruptly and without warning, it stopped.

The chain simply stopped moving. The machine made no noise. There was no sawing. Since checking the fuel (which had definitely not run out) is about the upper limit of my torridly masculine powers with chainsaws, I opted to phone my friendly tree surgeon for advice.

Our relationship is manly indeed.

I operate on his animals from time to time, and he chops limbs as required. You could say it is a wee club of surgeons.

‘Ah’ said my arborist chum. ‘There are a lot of things that could be.’ ‘Your chain brake might be faulty.’ ‘Or the sprockets in the nose of the bar might have seized.’ Or the bearings of the same might have gone.’ ‘Or it could be an issue with the oil pump or oil filter.’ ‘Just take off the side panel and…’.

My brain zoned out and I didn’t hear the rest of what he said. I had no idea what he was talking about. He had done the equivalent of me advising him how to spay a bitch. ‘First, induce anaesthesia with an intravenous injection, then maintain it with gas delivered via an endotracheal tube. Then, open her abdomen by incising the skin and linea alba, locate her uterus and then her ovary. Break the ovarian ligament, ligate the ovarian stump and remove the ovary.

Repeat on the other side, then exteriorise the cervix, figure of eight ligate it, thus removing the womb, then close the abdominal muscle with a synthetic, absorbable, monofilament suture, such as polydioxanaone and finish the procedure by opposing the skin edges.

Yup. It sounds so obvious, doesn’t it? And that’s the thing. When you know the answer to the million dollar question, it is easy. What nobody thinks of, however, is how much time, effort, research, blood, sweat and tears have gone into acquiring that knowledge in the first place.

Too often in my career, I have had clients complain that they don’t see why they should pay for a consultation because they were ‘only in the room for a few minutes and the vet just patted my dog.’

In reality, the time taken was generally about fifteen minutes and the fee charged was about equivalent to the hourly rate of a garage mechanic.

Additionally, experienced veterinary surgeons can indeed appear to be petting an animal when, in fact, they are carefully palpating and feeling. They will be able to describe the patient’s pulse, heart rate, respiratory rate, bladder, kidneys, lymph nodes and on and on. All will have been accomplished while simultaneously chatting amiably with the client. And, of course, five years of university training helps.

But here’s the rub. When you make it look too easy, you can inadvertently devalue your worth. It is not time people are paying for. It is knowledge.