It's "Carpe Diem" Time in 'All Creatures Great & Small' Season 4

Everybody loves a goat unless it’s on the kitchen table or in the pantry, and as All Creatures Great & Small opens this week, Skeldale House is undergoing a caprine invasion by sisters Betty (sore leg) and Hilda (along for the ride). The other guilty party is Siegfried Farnon, who flung open the surgery door searching for his suture kit, letting chaos reign. He complains that he didn’t mean livestock when he advised James to encourage clients to bring in their animals. Mid-shout, Siegfried is diverted by finding another lost item, his hoof knife. Goat owner Mrs. Stokes (Susan Hilton) ignores the bluster and produces a couple of jars of rhubarb jam as payment.

But! Siegfried assures James and Mrs. Hall that the days of chaos, lost items, and inefficiency are numbered. Miss Harbottle (Neve McIntosh), whom Siegfried met at the Farmers Union dance last week, arrives to discuss the offer Siegfried made during a thrilling foxtrot. She is a skilled administrator who has just left her job at a feed merchant’s and is ready to take on the practice. Her specialty is to bring order from chaos – just what the practice needs! As Siegfried shows her around, the missing suture kit shows up.

Miss Harbottle is mildly alarmed at the practice’s cash box, a pewter mug stuffed with money, and the messy appointment book buried beneath papers. She introduces a system of small pink notes for questions that Siegfried can answer at his leisure (which he’ll learn to hate and despise). As for James, he is furious that Miss Harbottle has been hired when the practice is in dire need of another veterinarian, not an administrator. (And shouldn’t James, as a partner, have a say in the matter?)