Large Animal & Equine Vet Tech - Education, Certifications & Salary

Veterinary technicians are an essential part of the animal medicine world. They provide highly skilled assistance to veterinarians. Veterinary medicine would fall apart without passion, effort, and energy. And just as tiny pets need time and attention, so too do large animals and horses. Because big animals require specialized care, large animal and equine (horse) vet techs are trained to handle the big responsibility of caring for these massive creatures.

Large animal and equine vet techs will often work directly with a veterinarian by helping restrain an animal, inserting catheters, floating (filing) horse teeth, or assisting in surgery. They may find themselves dressing wounds, helping with post-surgical care, or giving shots or injections. They help assess animals for lameness, provide mass injections to animal herds, or help with dehorning.

Large animal vet techs could also be involved with processes such as cleaning hooves or wrapping knees, legs, and tails to accelerate healing. A large animal or equine vet tech needs to be well prepared to respond to urgent calls and be calmly able to handle any situation, including helping with livestock birth. In addition, large animals are huge. A horse can weigh anywhere between 880 and 2,200 pounds, and the average weight of a dairy cow is 1,400 pounds. The capacity to handle and restrain these massive creatures means that good physical strength will be necessary.

These types of vet techs might be employed at ranches, breeding centers, research institutes, wildlife refuges, or zoos. They may find work at a university as part of an agricultural department or they could work in a clinic where the services are geared toward large animals or horses. Those who like the idea of working outside an office or traveling for work may find their home in big animal care. Since it’s pretty difficult to put a horse on an exam table, big animal and equine techs will likely spend some of their time traveling to the patient, instead of the other way around.

For vet techs whose spirits are up to the enormous challenge of caring for large animals and horses, the following article provides information on career outlook and earning potential, educational and experience requirements, and the path to becoming a certified large animal or equine veterinary technician.

Career Outlook for Large Animal And Equine Vet Techs

The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS 2024) predicts that nationwide job opportunities for vet techs will swell 19 percent between 2023 and 2033, adding 24,300 fresh openings to the 125,700 that existed in 2023. This rate of growth is almost five times the expected average for all occupations during the same period (4 percent).

While this information is not specific to big animal or equine techs, what is good for the whole industry also applies to these positions. The overarching trend in veterinary medicine points toward the acknowledgment that highly skilled techs are becoming more and more critical to the functioning of the animal medicine system. Animals big and small, veterinarians, and patients all need the nursing-style touch that vet techs bring to the animal medicine world.

Large Animal & Equine Vet Tech Salary Data

According to the BLS (May 2023), the average annual salary for veterinary technicians across the United States was $44,040. Since factors like experience can play a role in salary, the following chart demonstrates how the 122,000 vet techs in the United States earned across various earning percentiles:

Because specialties within the veterinary technician role have only been formally recognized for a relatively short time period, most salary aggregators and studies don’t dig deeper into how much vet techs make when they specialize. However, according to ZipRecruiter (October 2024) large animal veterinary technicians earned $45,144 annually across the United States. It also states that equine veterinary technicians earned an annual average salary of $45,144 nationwide.

While large and equine vet techs may have higher earning potential than generalists, higher salaries may also signify a higher cost of living. For example, the Missouri Economic Research and Information Center (MERIC 2024) provides a ranked list of how much it costs to live in every region of the United States. The cost of living in the most affordable state of West Virginia is less than half that in the most expensive state of Hawaii.

While some of the higher salaries for large animal vet techs may be due to the specialized skill set, it’s also possible that those salaries exist to ensure the vet tech has the monetary resources needed to pay for the basic expenses of life in their region.

Education and Certification Requirements for Equine and Large Animal Vet Techs

The requirements to work as a veterinary technician vary depending on the state in which a tech works. For some states, a vet tech needs no formal education and can become a vet tech simply through opportunity and hands-on experience. This reality is currently the exception to the rule, as most states require a vet tech to obtain veterinary technician licensing, registration, or certification to practice legally. The minimum educational attainment in these states is an associate’s degree from an accredited program.

The American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA) Committee on Veterinary Technician Education and Activities (CVTEA) is the accrediting body that ensures college programs are training veterinary technicians to an industry-useful standard. The programs listed on the AVMA CVTEA’s accredited vet tech schools will deliver either an associate or bachelor’s degree to the student, ensuring that graduates have the skills, knowledge, and attitudes necessary to contribute constructively to a veterinary medicine team.

In addition, all of these schools prepare students to sit for the Veterinary Technician National Examination (VTNE), the national exam vet techs must pass to practice in states that require licensure, registration, or certification.

Most vet tech programs are generalist programs—they train vet techs for any possible tech position in vet medicine. As a result, the majority include coursework on large animals. For example, the University of New Hampshire in Durham has coursework on large animal handling and offers an on-campus large animal experience within its associate of applied science program.

Less frequently, some programs focus fully on large animals or equine care for those that are sure that large animals are their career path. For example, Otterbein University of Westerville, OH offers a four-year bachelor’s degree in equine veterinary technology. Even in regions with no equine or large-animal-specific programs, most vet tech programs have a practical component like an externship or internship.

Students interested in working with horses or large animals can leverage this requirement by choosing internships or externships where they work with big creatures.

Veterinary Technician Specialist Certifications for Large Animals and Horses

Once a vet tech graduates from an accredited two- or four-year program and passes their VTNE, they are considered registered, licensed, or certified veterinary technicians (RVT, LVT, CVT). At this point, they can become large animal and/or horse specialists simply through experience.

However, those who are interested in holding themselves to the highest standard possible for veterinary technicians with specialized skills may consider becoming certified veterinary technician specialists (VTS) in the subfields that intersect with their large animal skills. Except for the VTS (Equine) certification, the 16 National Association of Veterinary Technicians in America (NAVTA) Committee on Veterinary Technician Specialties (CVTS) recognized or provisionally recognized specialties aren’t directly focused on large animals. With that said, an LVT could choose to fulfill the requirements of each of those sixteen specialties in an environment where they’re working with large animals.

Becoming a VTS is a years-long process demonstrating to the industry that a vet tech has achieved certain experiential and skill-based milestones that differentiate them from the generalized pool of vet techs. Earning a VTS may lead to higher pay, expanded responsibilities, or a more competitive resume in a competitive job market. A separate NAVTA-recognized academy administers each VTS certification, and therefore each certification has different requirements. The requirements to sit for the certification test to become a VTS (Equine) through the Academy of Equine Veterinary Nursing Technicians (AEVNT), are as follows:

• Proof of at least 8,000 hours (four years) of work experience, including 3,750 hours working in equine nursing

• A filled out advanced skills checklist

• 50 CE hours completed in the previous four years, ten of which need to be in the year previous to the exam

• 50 to 75 cases documented in a case log

• Five detailed case reports

• Proof of LVT/CVT/RVT

• One letter of intent

• Two letters of recommendation

• CV

• Several fees

While not exactly the same, each VTS certification has similar requirements of a certain number of years of experience, proof of knowledge and skills, and recommendations from certified mentors. Details on the requirements to become certified in the other 15 veterinary technician specialties can be found in the guide to becoming a vet tech specialist.