Martin Weaver

Martin Weaver, who has died aged 50, was one of the country's leading veterinary surgeons. He had a lifelong love of animals and as a teenager had a large collection of canaries which his parents somewhat reluctantly inherited when he went to Glasgow University. He qualified in 1986 and for the next two years worked in general practice in Dunoon and then Thirsk in Yorkshire.

Mr Weaver was born in Glasgow to an English father and German mother. Due to his knowledge of German, he chose to become an intern in Munich University between 1988-1990 and during that time obtained a Doctor of Med Vet. For the following two years he worked as an intern in Bernhard Huskamp's famous Tierklinik Hochmoor Equine Clinic in Germany.

On returning to Britain, he was awarded a HBLB Scholarship to undertake a residency in Equine Diagnostic Imaging at the University of Cambridge which he performed between 1991 and 1994. During this residency he obtained both the RCVS certificate of Veterinary Radiology and later the RCVS Diploma in Veterinary Radiology.

He then became a research assistant in the Royal Veterinary College in London during which time he completed a PhD on the pathology of equine navicular disease. In 1997 he moved to the Veterinary Faculty of University College Dublin, where he was a lecturer in large animal surgery with a continued strong interest in imaging, and zoo animal medicine.

He remained in UCD until 2001 when he joined the equine department of the Royal (Dick) School of Veterinary Studies of the University of Edinburgh, where he was a senior lecturer in equine surgery specialising in imaging and orthopaedics.

Following his residency at Cambridge, Mr Weaver remained deeply involved with veterinary imaging including acting as an RCVS examiner, treasurer of the European Association of Veterinary Diagnostic Imaging and as an external examiner for many universities. He contributed to continuing education courses in large animal radiology at the universities of Glasgow and Cambridge, Royal Veterinary College, London, and University of Sassari, Sardinia.

He also had many refereed publications, mainly on bovine orthopaedics earlier in his career, and latterly on equine lameness especially back problems and on equine imaging.

Mr Weaver had a kind, mellow personality and a great sense of humour. He loved teaching both undergraduate and postgraduate students and obtained the highest student teaching appraisals, including for his regular voluntary tutorials after normal working hours with final year students.

His talent as a teacher were also due to his great ability as a story teller. He never tired of telling his famous gorilla story. When working in UCD, he had to treat a gorilla in Dublin Zoo – first needing to anaesthetise it with drugs fired from an anaesthetic dart rifle. However, whilst aiming the rifle though the bars of the cage, the gorilla suddenly shot across the cage and pulled the rifle out of Mr Weaver's hands –after an anxious pause, the gorilla then bent the rifle in two and handed it back.

In addition to his undergraduate teaching, Mr Weaver was also supportive of younger staff members and ran imaging and surgery rounds for them in the morning before normal working hours. He was treasurer of the Dick Vet Students' successful Exmoor Pony Trekking Society, helping enormously with its administration and financial stability for many years.

He had many outside interests including hillwalking in his beloved Scotland and on the continent, and latterly sea kayaking. He sang in the Heriot Watt University Choir (although a University of Edinburgh staff member) and was involved in contemporary literature, spending holidays at book festivals.

At the end of 2010, he found out that an illness that he had been receiving treatment for a prolonged period was in fact cancer that now had metastasised and was untreatable. He bore this bravely without complaint, continuing to work at the veterinaryschool until three days before his death.

His colleagues and present and former students will always remember his great contributions to the Veterinary School over the last 10 years – especially his outstanding teaching.

He is survived by his wife Jane, his parents David and Ruth, siblings Christoph and Annette and their families.