Animal Magic

by Carolyn Press-McKenzie

  On the way home I asked the kids how they felt.

  ‘Jeeze, I’ve never seen anything like that. Do we seriously eat that shit? It stank. How could he let them live like that?’ said Jack, who was fresh out of prison.

  I wondered if he saw the connection between the experience he had just lived through and what these chooks had lived through.

  I was delighted when the workers asked me if they could produce a YouTube video about their experience so they could tell people where their eggs came from, and I said that I thought it was a lovely idea. So they set about making the video with the hope that it would help with factory-farming awareness. They were serious and on a mission, which is not an unexpected response when people see ex-battery hens for the first time. Aside from saving their lives, this is the very reason we liberate the chooks. Spreading the word within the community once the chooks have been visited by shocked family and neighbours is invaluable.

  CHAPTER 31

  Laurie gets his Jungle

  We were still dealing with the end of kitten season.

  There had been a constant flow of kittens from people who wanted their kids to see a litter, or who had forgotten to desex their cat, or orphans whose mums had died or disappeared. They all needed to be bottle fed and eventually rehomed, and the team very quickly became masters at it. Once weaned, desexed and at ten weeks old we would advertise the kittens on Facebook. After checking all the new homes thoroughly, we would then wave a bittersweet goodbye.

  One week towards the end of the season a wild kitten was dropped off. I asked the admin team if they would like to set up a dog crate by their desks so that the kitten could get used to people and movement. This is a technique called flooding, where you flood the animal with stimuli to help them get used to a busy environment and get over their fears. But as one of the girls leaned into the crate to stroke the little wild kitten, I decided on a change of plan.

  The little tabby girl was only about five or six weeks old. She was quite sweet, but being born behind a supermarket had already given her street smarts and human interaction was not something she craved. As she hissed and spat at the team’s efforts I couldn’t help but admire how robust and confident she seemed, almost older and wiser than her years . . . well, her weeks.

  ‘Let’s try her with Laurie,’ I announced. I thought it was a great idea for both monkey and kitten.

  ‘Are you serious?’ came a mixed chorus of surprise and excitement from around the room.

  ‘Yip, I think she is just what Laurie needs—and I think he might just be the best thing to happen to her too.’

  Just months before, we had finally managed to remove the collar and chain that was such a harsh reminder of Laurie’s previous life. It was wonderful to get rid of them and it certainly made us feel better, but the odd thing was that in a very dysfunctional way it didn’t seem to make Laurie feel better . . . well, not in the beginning anyway.

  As part of his rite of passage in the circus, Laurie had had his canine teeth chopped or filed down. They were left blunt and the nerves exposed. He had clearly lived that way for years, maybe even more than a decade, but recently bilateral abscesses had developed under his chin and we needed to get him to the vets urgently to have all four canines removed. So while little Laurie was sleeping peacefully under anaesthetic we took the opportunity to remove his collar and chain.

  When Laurie awoke, we expected him to feel confused and probably slightly violated that his teeth were gone, though we hoped that ultimately the relief from pain would make it worthwhile for him. What we hadn’t expected was how completely shattered he was not to have his chain. He was a mess. He would sit away from us and scream, rocking back and forth and looking confused. He wanted to trust us but couldn’t.

  Laurie had grown so much confidence in his time with us, and part of that was because he felt like he had some control. If he wanted to interact he would pass us, and in particular his favourite person, Jim, his chain. And if he didn’t want to spend time with us he would guard his chain with crossed arms and chatter nervously, cueing us to respect his privacy. But to Laurie, no chain meant no routine, no system, no control. He was a wreck. And to make matters worse, he blamed Jim. Before they’d had a bromance going on, but now he wouldn’t let Jim near him. He clearly felt deeply betrayed.

  So Laurie had been pretty inconsolable for months. He was now living full-time in his new enclosure. He had trees and forts and ropes and swings, but as far as social contact went, we were just the people who delivered the food and if we tried to engage any more than that he would slip into a panicked rage, frantically crossing his arms across his bare chest where the chain, his tool of communication, had once rested. Jim and I had learnt time and time again that in any situation involving an animal, patience is key. Laurie was safe, he was loved, he was more enriched than he had probably ever been in his sad and lonely life. He had us whenever he needed us, and although he was confused we knew that time would heal and eventually he would let us enrich his life more with our interactive company. But in the meantime I wondered if this little kitten could become someone special in Laurie’s life.

  So all fifteen of us excitedly waited for Jim to come home from work early so he and I could oversee the introduction together.

  We knew that Laurie was gentle with other animals as he already lived with two giant Flemish bunnies that had been handed over to us one day. Jelly and Bean divided their time between Laurie and Charlie, happily hopping around their enclosures and mowing the lawns with a peaceful contentment and ease. They seemed none the wiser that it was not normal for bunnies to live with monkeys, and just appeared very happy to have the biggest bunny runs they had ever seen.

  As Jim sat down and Laurie sat close by, I perched next to them with little Miss Hissy Spitty on my knee. Laurie saw her straight away and started to chatter and rock, holding his arms firmly crossed against his chest. He was nervous, but he was also interested. The bossy little kitten then jumped off my knee. She had zero interest in people and couldn’t get herself away from me fast enough. Laurie inched closer to her, still chattering and swaying dysfunctionally, the way he always did when he felt out of his depth and out of control. Then it happened.

  The kitten walked over to Laurie bold as brass and head-butted him gently in the leg. Laurie snapped out of his rocking immediately as if he had been slapped in the face by a friend telling him to calm down. He refocused on the little kitten, but this time instead of guarding his non-existent chain, he reached out and touched the kitten’s back gingerly with one pointed finger, ET-style. ‘Awww,’ he said as the kitten continued to nudge him and rub up against him. ‘Awww.’ The kitten started to purr and Jim and I and the workers, looking on quietly from outside the enclosure, just smiled.

  It took us about half an hour to settle on the name Jungle for the kitten.

  ‘I know Laurie will never have a normal life,’ I explained to the kids, ‘but I like the idea of him having a jungle.’

  Jungle and Laurie are a tight twosome: they eat together, sleep together, play and hunt together. They groom and sunbathe together. And the more their relationship grew in its early stages, the more they both relaxed around us. As Jungle matured she was allowed in and out of the enclosure. We have never caged her in, and her place of choice is with her best friend Laurie. Our little social experiment had worked; Laurie has his Jungle, but most importantly he has learned how to communicate and express himself without his chain.

  CHAPTER 32

  An emu, a pig, a turkey and Colonel Stinky

  ‘Come on, team, we are on a mission,’ I called out, as they all walked in the door early one morning.

  A petting zoo had closed its doors and some of the older breeding stock needed saving. It was the usual story; all the purpose-bred babies, and the pretty and fancy animals, had been sold and the owners did not have the heart to kill the old breeding stock that had been keeping them in good supply of cute babes but were now deemed worthless.

&n
bsp; Knowing that no animals are worthless to HUHA, they had asked us to come and collect the last of them. I never said no—we valued the animals’ lives and would never begrudge a chance to save them—but as we had time and time again, we were starting to feel very used. I explained the situation to the kids as we drove there. Once we had these animals in our care, we would have the vet out and it was likely that we would easily spend a thousand dollars to desex and treat any medical problems that had gone unnoticed to date. Then these animals, the old and the ugly that the petting zoo themselves had deemed not fit for display, would stay in our care for some time while we looked for new homes. If no home was found then they were ours. So one quick phone call from this business to off-load and ease their guilt, in reality, was about to cost us several years of time, money and commitment. We didn’t mind doing it for the sake of the animals; we just quietly wished that folk appreciated what their actions and constant breeding caused.

  As we arrived at the petting zoo, we were introduced to our new friends. One big fat kune kune boar, one big old turkey gobbler, one extremely stroppy and old emu and one very large and stinky undesexed goat.

  Well, it all started rather sadly. The emu was in quite the state; his buddies had been rounded up and taken away, and, left behind on his own, he was clearly anxious. Knowing he would be too much for me and my inexperienced team we called in the local SPCA inspectors for help. One rounded the emu quietly from one direction and another inspector from the other. But the moment they had their arms around the emu’s neck, his old and stressed heart literally stopped. I flew into vet nurse mode and administered mouth to beak and vigorously massaged his heart, but he was gone. My workers were completely at a loss. They had excitedly sat on the paddock’s edge expecting to see an exhilarating rodeo act, but instead they got to see a majestic bird die literally of a broken heart. So far this was not turning out to be a fun mission.

  The gobbler was an easy catch and we settled him into his crate relatively quickly. Then there was the boar that the team had already named Elvis. He fussed and grunted but we eventually guided him gently up the ramp to his side of the float. It was rewarding to see my young helpers breathe and take their time with him. They were learning that when it comes to animals, slow and steady wins the race.

  So we had a turkey in the front of the float and a boar to the left of the back divider. We just needed a big old stinky goat to the right and we would be home free.

  I had never seen horns quite as impressive at such close range. And boy, what a smell. Although the team were well briefed on remaining as professional and well-mannered as possible while we were out and about, I couldn’t blame them for the choking and coughing, and even rolling on the ground, when the stench of the male goat hit our nostrils. He was an overpowering musky, toxic mess. And to top it off, to the kids’ mixed delight and horror, he had demonstrated a nasty habit of cocking his leg, twisting his head around and weeing into his own mouth.

  On the drive back to HUHA we all stank, and we could even taste the thick odour in the air of our double-cab ute as we drove with all the windows right down.

  The very next day the workers were present as the vet neutered both Elvis and the goat they had fondly named Colonel Stinky. Desexing seemed to fascinate the team, appealing to some deep-seated macabre interest they held. Who knew castrating adult animals was such a thrilling business? But the transition to becoming testosterone-free was worth every drop of blood lost by these two seasoned gentlemen—with anaesthetics and pain relief they breezed through the messy and life-changing surgery. They were now socially acceptable and carefree. So after a mandatory stand-down period while all evidence of sperm left their bodies, the team helped me merge them in with their new four-legged families—there would be no more solitary confinement for these boys.

  For Elvis, his new life meant lazy days lying in the sun, spooning his new kune kune friends. His only worry was what time breakfast would arrive on the back of the quad bike. He was as happy as a pig in mud and with the beautiful natural springs that threaded like veins through his paddock bursting from the ground, he literally was.

  For the Colonel it was romance. He had caught the eye of Munchkin, a very sweet little goat that I had hand-raised after her mother had been shot by a hunter. She had been found alone in the bush and brought to us. Munchkin was a permanent resident at the sanctuary and her cheeky antics meant that she enjoyed hanging with the Community Maxers and often involved herself in their daily chores; she actually appreciated the company of her human friends more than that of other goats. So it was surprising and exciting when Munchkin became completely smitten with a non-human; she idolised Stinky and he her. The two of them ate, slept and adventured the deer-fenced paddock together, but their favourite spot on the property was a large purpose-built climbing frame, topped with a platform that had a view fit for a king and queen . . . and at HUHA Kaitoke that’s just what they were.

  CHAPTER 33

  Stanley

  Once again I found myself meeting a precious package in a carpark.

  One of my friends had spotted an ad for a little dog on the Trade Me website. Apparently he was disabled and only had half a heart. I couldn’t even begin to wrap my head around what that meant but said to my friend that if the family needed our help then we would be happy to step in. So little Stanley was put on the Petbus, a pet transportation service, and I was ready and waiting for his delivery.

  ‘Oh my goodness!’ My eyes widened as little Stanley was passed out the door and into my arms. I was totally enchanted. But I couldn’t believe that anyone would have popped an animal this fragile on a bus to who knows where. Of course we weren’t who knows where, but how did they truly know that? This little man needed some serious protecting and I vowed there and then to find out exactly what had happened to his crippled little body and to provide him with everything and anything he needed to keep him safe, happy and well.

  The local vets puzzled at Stanley. They weren’t too sure what was going on with his twisted limbs. So together Stanley and I journeyed up north to New Zealand’s largest veterinary teaching hospital, where they had all the diagnostic bells and whistles at their disposal. I wanted some answers.

  Oh, it was just too sad. The vets rattled off a list of things that seemed to be affecting Stanley’s wee body: dwarfism, an overshot jaw, a tumour under his tongue, deformed little legs. All these ailments were most likely caused by a condition called storage disease, a rare inherited metabolic disorder.

  I already knew a little bit about storage disease because years earlier a litter of huntaway pups had ended up on our doorstep. That night they were all over the news as these particular pups had been stolen from a research facility. They were tracked down to us and we were told by the police to return them. We hadn’t been involved in their acquisition, but did feel strongly that we should see the situation they came from for ourselves.

  So we had driven to Palmerston North and handed them back to their owner. Apparently the bitch was a private dog who was born with the disease. The researchers would borrow her so they could impregnate her with the sperm of another dog that carried the storage disease gene in the hope that their pups would also be burdened with the disease. We were told at the time that everything would be done to make sure that the pups’ lives were as normal and wonderful as possible. What they didn’t tell us was that the pups would only be grown to a certain age and then they would be killed and dissected in the name of science and improving medicines for people.

  It was such a huge can of worms, and we were new to all of it. But the police knew we had the pups and we had to hand them back to the owner. It was heartbreaking but there was nothing else we could do.

  And just a few years later here was Stanley with the same disease, except it wasn’t—his was a rarer type. Stanley’s version of the disease was closer to the one that human children got. He was a find of scientific significance. A month or so later the head of the research department in Palmerston No
rth drove the five-hour round trip to see Stanley for himself and take some blood to confirm the find. He then set about pitching his plan to me.

  They would like Stanley’s sperm so they could impregnate one of the bitches who carried the gene. They were hoping that the pups would get Stanley’s version of the disease.

  ‘But won’t you just kill the pups to dissect them?’ I asked the researcher.

  He looked me straight in the eye and in a honourably honest and frank manner said, ‘Yes’. In an effort to seal the deal he continued, ‘But we have underfloor heating in our kennels now, so they will be very comfortable and content before we have to kill them.’

  ‘Hmm,’ was all I could muster.

  I listened to him telling me the long, complex stories of the children he had met with storage disease. He explained with great emotion and concern the suffering the children went through and how research on Stanley’s pups could mean the difference between finding and not finding a possible cure or at least a way to prevent or understand the disease.

  ‘Hmmm.’

  I do care about people, of course I do, but it just wasn’t right. I kindly declined his offer but, not wanting to be the reason for children suffering, I promised them Stanley’s body when he died. I knew he would only be with us for a matter of months, so my promise was that I would let them know when the time was right and I would donate them his wee broken body. The decision sat right and as I explained the situation to the team their faces turned from horror to pride.

  The Community Maxers had been amazing with Stanley. The admin team would sit him on their knees or up on their desks while they worked; the animal care team would take him in a little Paris Hilton-style carry bag and settle him down in the long grass while they picked up horse poo and did their chores. When we went on road trips Stanley came too. He was never alone and although his limbs could not carry him, the team did and he wanted for nothing. He was loved, cherished and pain-free. Until the tumour under his tongue grew just too large.