In my 14 years at The Horse, I’ve been to a lot of veterinary meetings. (No, really, a lot of them.) But I had never attended an American College of Theriogenology (ACT) annual meeting until a couple weeks ago.  What’s theriog É. uh, that, you ask? It’s the study of animal reproduction.

Equine veterinarians wanting to specialize in reproduction complete an internship in therio and then take an ACT exam at an annual meeting to become boarded. Once they’ve passed the test, they carry the letters “Dipl. ACT” behind their veterinary degreesÑoften you’ll see veterinarians with this designation practicing as specialists at equine referral practices or in veterinary teaching hospitals, and you’ll see many of these veterinarians as sources in breeding-related articles on TheHorse.com.