A farmer’s son from Wigtownshire who previously claimed he would ‘never trim cows’ feet for a living’ has become a global internet sensation on the back of his cattle hoof trimming business.
Graeme Parker, better known as The Hoof GP, runs the world’s largest agricultural YouTube channel and trims the hoofs of 300 cows each week.
Since launching his YouTube and Facebook accounts, he has pulled in a combined total of 3 million subscribers and has had an incredible 2.1 billion views between the two sites.
He receives around 5,000 to 7,500 comments per day from his agricultural and non-agricultural fans which his wife Ashley monitors alongside the paperwork.
In the last 14 years, The Hoof GP has trimmed the feet of 200,000 dairy and beef cows throughout Scotland and England.
He now works in a 25-mile radius from his home near Wigtown in South West Scotland.
The Hoof GP has trimmed the hoofs of 200,000 cattle
Most of his business is routine work on dairy farms, with 90% of the hoof trimming on dairy cows and 10% on beef cows which is usually down to an overgrown hoof.
The Press & Journal caught up with The Hoof GP this week.
How did your successful business begin?
I grew up on a 700-acre beef and sheep farm in Wigtownshire, which was home to 300 beef cows and 600 breeding ewes. It was always my intention to farm it. Devastatingly, my father died when I was 15 and things changed. After school, I went into the hospitality sector and ran a couple of highly award winning restaurants, pubs and coffee shops.
My mother remarried my late stepfather Davie, who was a cattle hoof trimmer but when he became ill, I decided it was time for something different and I would take up his freeze branding business. I built up hundreds of customers, being the largest in the UK. I was only visiting farms once per year but I still got to know my customers really well.
After a while at the freeze branding, I moved into hoof trimming and I started out by using the farmers’ crushes at a discounted rate. I couldn’t afford a crush at that time so I was just using basic ones on the farms.
Largest agricultural YouTube channel in the world
Davie had built over 300 crushes in his time so I knew roughly what I was looking for. I built a rudimental crush which lasted about a year and then I built a hydraulic one.
After that, I bought a second hand Wopa 51 hydraulic crush from Holland, followed by an Appleton Steel, which I bought via YouTube. These crushes are known as the best in the world and I’ve still got it.
How did The Hoof GP become a recognised name?
I started a Facebook page and became very active on it, posting stories and running online forums. I was always a bit worried about the backlash I could receive because not everyone fully understands the hoof trimming process. That’s when I knew educative videos would become extremely important.
The YouTube channel was created on the back of a video I saw online. It was a video of lame cows on a farm in Russia. This video went viral and for all the wrong reasons. Somebody had filmed 30 or 40 very lame cows crossing a road but there was no context with it. It did look bad but the video told the viewers nothing. They could have required treatment but they also could have been treated and were recovering. To see a video of 30 or 40 cows lame seems a lot but what we don’t know is, they could have been on a farm with 10,000 cows so that would have been a small percentage of lame cows.
It was after this video I decided to start educating and protect farmers because our industry does receive a lot of backlashes and it’s usually down to a misunderstanding. If I receive a negative comment on social media, we tend to reply and try to educate, rather than remove it.
Educating the public and protecting farmers through videos
My videos are taken out on farms and I make sure to include all the ‘not so glamorous parts’ as that’s what the viewers seem to like. I try to keep them humorous too.
How has your business changed your life?
It’s been huge and has completely changed my life. I struggled with mental health before but this has given me a focus. The well wishes from the public are amazing. I’ve been invited on free trips to so many countries around the world including Florida, Japan and New Zealand.
I’ve also launched online and practical hoof trimming courses due to popular demand and we had 606 people sign up in the first two months. From a financial point, the YouTube revenue and income has been life changing.
I’ll never forget the time I was going through security in an airport in California and the first member of staff I came across recognised me. That was pretty surreal!
