The Travelling Vet

by Jonathan Cranston

  Gestation: 16–18 months.

  Weight: Newborn calves weigh 40–65 kg, reaching an adult weight of between 1,700 kg (females) and 2,300 kg (males).

  Growth: Females tend to live in crashes of up to 14 animals; males are usually solitary, but will stay with a female for up to 20 days at mating. The female raises a solitary calf, only giving birth every 3 to 5 years. The calf will stay with the mother until about 3 years. Females reach sexual maturity at about 5 years, while males reach sexual maturity at about 7 years.

  Body temperature: 36.6–37.2 °C.

  Interesting fact: Contrary to popular belief, the name ‘white rhino’ doesn’t refer to its colour, but comes from a mistranslation of the Dutch word ‘wijd’, meaning ‘wide’, referring to the width of its mouth which distinguishes it from the narrow pointed mouth of the black rhino.

  Conservation: Of the five species of rhinoceros the IUCN identifies the black, Javan and Sumatran as ‘critically endangered’, the Indian as ‘vulnerable’ and the white as ‘near threatened’. The statistics surrounding rhinos are horrifying: only about 275 Sumatran rhinos and a mere 60 Javan rhinos remain in the wild; between the 1960s and 1990s black rhino populations fell from 70,000 to 2,410, and the Indian rhino to about 1,870. In 2007 13 rhinos were poached in the whole of South Africa; in 2014 the number reached 1,215, which equates to more than 3 a day. So although there are estimated to be around 20,000 white rhinos in the wild, and about 4,500 black rhinos, at current poaching rates rhinos will be extinct from Africa within 25 years. What is more, the manner in which these animals are brutally slaughtered leaves them to suffer and die in agony. Saving the Survivors is an incredible charity whose focus is on the treatment and care of all wildlife, but particularly rhinos that have fallen victim to poaching or traumatic incidents. See www.savingthesurvivors.org.

  11

  DONKEY

  ‘I hope you heard that? She called me a noble steed. She thinks I’m a steed.’

  Donkey in Shrek

  ‘It’s John from the donkey sanctuary here,’ came the familiar Wiltshire accent over the phone.

  ‘Hi, John, how are you?’

  ‘Oh, very well, sir, very well, thank you – and you?’ came the usual reply. Born of a lost generation where manners were everything, it was always so humbling when an older gentleman to whom I felt a natural deference, addressed me with such regard. In John’s eyes, though, as a veterinary surgeon I deserved respect. In turn I admired and respected John immensely for his lifetime of unassuming, selfless dedication to the care of neglected animals, and in particular, donkeys. It was this mutual respect that was central to our working relationship and served to benefit the goats, pigs, sheep, dogs, cats and 120 donkeys at the sanctuary John had established over thirty years before.

  ‘I’m well, thanks. The usual problem of not having enough hours in the day!’

  ‘Indeed, Jon, indeed, always too much to do when it comes to caring for animals.’

  ‘How can I help?’

  ‘Jon, it’s Pollyanne. She’s gone lame again on both front feet. It’s a worry with Carmen coming up in a couple of months, she needs to be sound and ready for that. It’s the last run and they’ll be devastated if she can’t be on stage.’

  Pollyanne was, without question, the star and public face of the donkey sanctuary. John had rescued her from Salisbury Livestock Market in 1997, where he had found her distressed, severely neglected and destined for imminent slaughter. Appalled by her condition, he had immediately offered to buy her there and then, and taken her home. It had taken a huge amount of work to gain her trust, and a long programme of farriery to rectify the years of neglect to her feet, but after many months’ care she had come round, and she and John had formed an inseparable bond. Thriving on attention, she soon became the natural choice for Nativity plays, Palm Sunday services and any other event where a donkey was required. From the sanctuary’s perspective too, she exemplified everything it stood for and was striving to achieve: providing a home for neglected donkeys where they were cared for, nurtured, and encouraged to trust humanity again.

  Pollyanne turned out to be such a natural performer, in fact, that after being talent-spotted at an event, she was signed by a specialist agency providing animals for TV, film and theatre. Her first professional role was at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, starring alongside Plácido Domingo in I Pagliacci. On one notorious occasion she even upstaged him from the wings by braying noisily as he was singing one of his arias leading him to call her ‘a great scene-stealer’. Nevertheless, Pollyanne went down a storm, and so when a donkey was sought for Francesca Zambello’s 2006 production of Carmen to mark the sixtieth anniversary of the founding of the Royal Opera, Pollyanne was a natural choice.

  Fast-forward nine years, and Pollyanne had appeared every year in the celebrated production of Bizet’s Spanish masterpiece, but 2015 was set to be its last run. Pollyanne had been so popular, among the cast and audience alike, that for her not to be able to perform in Carmen was unthinkable.

  ‘I think it’s her laminitis flaring up again, but it seems worse than normal,’ continued John. ‘I’ve tried to bring her into her stable from the paddock, but she’s so sore she doesn’t want to move.’

  ‘Poor Pollyanne! I’ve got a few things on this morning, but I could come out this afternoon about three o’clock. How would that suit?’

  ‘That would do nicely, thank you, sir.’

  ‘Great. Meawhile, give her half a sachet of painkiller and see if that makes her comfortable enough to bring her into her stable in an hour or so.’

  As a result of her years of neglect, Pollyanne had periodically suffered from bouts of laminitis, a painful inflammatory condition of the tissues that bond the hoof wall to its pedal bone. Over the years John had learnt how to manage these flare-ups in her condition through a combination of painkillers, diet and a bed of deep shavings for a couple of weeks until things settled. However, they had occasionally been so bad that she required more intensive treatment, and it would take much longer for her lameness to fully resolve. If that was the case this time, there really was a genuine question as to whether Pollyanne would be healthy enough to make the two-hour lorry journey to the Royal Opera House in a couple of months’ time, so I fully understood John’s concern and prayed it wouldn’t be that serious.

  It was a little before 3 p.m. when I drove down Old Didcot Road and turned into the donkey sanctuary. John was waiting as I pulled up at the gate into the yard, and he came striding over to open it. Then in his mid-seventies, he was still incredibly fit, but that was hardly surprising: he was a true worker, so passionate about his donkeys and other animals that to him his job was as pleasurable as a hobby. I was sure that in the thirty-two years since he had set up the sanctuary, he could count the number of days’ holiday he had taken on two hands.

  As I got out of the car, he greeted me with his usual broad grin and firm handshake. Dressed in his customary heavy-duty black ankle boots, brown corduroy trousers, checked shirt, grey knitted V-neck sleeveless jumper and his faithful flat cap, he was ever the country gentleman, although his clothes, like his hands, told the same story of years of toil and hardship.

  ‘Good afternoon, sir. Thank you very much for coming.’

  ‘It’s a pleasure, John. Now, how is she?’

  ‘Oh, not very good … not very good at all.’

  ‘Did you get the painkiller into her, and did you manage to get her in from the paddock?’

  ‘I did, yes, she’s had half a sachet of Bute, and Linda and I managed to walk her in an hour ago, but she’s still incredibly sore.’

  ‘Let’s have a look at her then.’

  We strolled over to the old ramshackle wooden barn next to the staff room, which was used as the infirmary. Full of cobwebs, with a pen for a sheep and goat, chickens nesting among four square straw bales, the odd farm cat peering out from behind a bag of corn, and a pile of baler twine and empty feed bags in the corner, it was an image of a forgot
ten time. For that very reason, it was my favourite place at the sanctuary and, of course, where I ended up spending the majority of my time.

  Pollyanne was in the first of the two stalls. Despite the painkillers, and the deep straw bedding to cushion her feet, she was in obvious pain. Standing with her forelegs straight in front of her, resting her weight on her heels, she had the classic laminitic stance. There was none of the friendly, inquisitive nuzzling with which she usually greeted strangers as I stepped over the three-foot stainless-steel sheep fencing into her pen. Instead, her ears were down, and her eyes bulging, emphasizing the discomfort she felt.

  ‘I see what you mean, John. She really is struggling, isn’t she?’

  ‘It’s the worst I’ve seen her in eighteen years.’

  Never one to exaggerate, John didn’t say that lightly. I bent down and felt for her digital pulses. They were pounding, and there was also noticeable heat in her hooves. I was keen to lift up her feet to have a look at her soles, but transferring further weight onto an already painful foot was something she firmly resisted and thus didn’t warrant the further distress it would have caused.

  ‘Yeah, it’s laminitis all right, and given how painful she is, I think we should X-ray her feet and make sure nothing catastrophic is going on in that hoof.’

  ‘Whatever you suggest,’ John replied.

  ‘I could borrow our practice’s machine, but I won’t be able to get back out with it again until Thursday at the earliest, so I think it’s best if I refer her so we can get the ball rolling as soon as possible.’

  If her pedal bone was rotating and slipping through the hoof, then Pollyanne’s condition was extremely serious and would need intensive remedial work by a farrier to address the problem. The only way of accurately assessing whether there was any rotation, and if so how much, was by X-raying the feet. It was a simple job, but because she was in so much pain, she was unfit to travel and so the X-raying would need to be done at the sanctuary, and this required a portable machine. There was a very good equine specialist hospital not far away and they had a very experienced farrier who would be able to manage her feet and give her the best chance of a speedy recovery.

  ‘I’ll give them a call now,’ I explained to John, ‘and see if someone can come out to X-ray her feet this afternoon. Then we can take it from there. In the meantime I’ll give her a sedation and some more pain relief and put some temporary cushioning pads on the bottom of her feet. Hopefully that’ll help her a little.’

  Returning to my car, I made the call, grabbed some bandage material and soft supportive pads, and drew up a couple of injections, which I then administered. After a few minutes Pollyanne was sleepy enough for us to lift each front foot in turn so I could bandage the cushioning in place. Ten minutes later the job was done.

  ‘I’m much obliged to you,’ said John, handing me a coffee. ‘You know what Pollyanne means to me. They’re all special, of course, but I’ve never had a donkey like her … She really is a special one, all right.’

  ‘Someone will be out between about five and five thirty this afternoon,’ I reported, taking a sip.

  ‘Very good, very good. Thank you.’

  ‘They’ll let me know what they find, and then we’ll take it from there. I can come back out in due course to check on her, but they’ll probably manage her from here on.’

  ‘Right you are, Jon.’

  So after my coffee and my usual enjoyable chat with John, I bid him farewell and headed off in my car.

  That evening I got a phone call from the vet with the results of Pollyanne’s X-ray. There was a small amount of pedal bone rotation in both feet, he told me, but fortunately she wasn’t in imminent danger of her bone slipping through her sole. She would need some remedial care to correct and settle things, which would take time to resolve, but he was optimistic that she would be sound in plenty of time for the opera. It was encouraging news and, although he’d already told a very relieved John, I rang him to check in.

  ‘Hi, John, I’ve just spoken with the vet. It sounds like it’s really the best possible news.’

  ‘So it is, Jon, I’m mighty relieved and very grateful to you for your help. If all goes to plan, there’ll be no holding her back in six weeks.’ The anxiety I had heard in his voice that morning had gone. ‘And Jon? As this is the last year she’s performing, you’d be more than welcome to come up with us to one of her performances and be with us backstage.’

  ‘I would love that, thank you!’

  ‘That’s settled then. It’s the least I can do. I’ll get Wendy to send you a list of possible dates and then you can let me know which one suits you.’

  ‘Perfect, I’ll really look forward to that.’

  ‘Good. It’s quite an experience – and you’ll have to excuse my outfit.’ He laughed. ‘I look quite the character when I’m all made up.’

  ‘I’ll wait to hear from Wendy. Thank you, John. And let me know if I can help any further with Pollyanne, but it sounds like she’s in good hands.’

  After a couple of weeks’ slow progress, Pollyanne suddenly turned a corner, and a month later she was back to trotting around the field as though nothing had happened and, much to everyone’s delight, the opera was back on. Wendy sent me a list of dates when Pollyanne would be performing, and I was pleased to see that I’d be in London for one of them, which sounded like a fun way to finish a day of meetings.

  And so on a cold, crisp Tuesday evening in November I found myself turning off Bow Street into a virtually deserted Floral Street. Parked up next to the tall black double doors of the backstage entrance, John’s elderly maroon converted Ford Transit horsebox looked entirely out of place. The stage doors were so tall you could walk a giraffe in through them with ease. A security guard stood on patrol, eyeing me suspiciously as I headed over towards the trailer, but before he could engage me, John appeared out of a nearby door, wiping his mouth with a handkerchief.

  ‘Perfect timing, Jon,’ he said, shaking my hand. ‘I’ve just had a lovely dinner courtesy of the Opera House in their restaurant. Have you eaten? They’ll feed you if not? You have? Oh, very well, very well.’ He turned to the trailer. ‘And what about you, Pollyanne, is it time for your pre-performance snacks?’ The trailer shook as she stomped inside, responding to the familiar voice. ‘You’ve been a very patient girl, as always.’ He started unbolting the backdoor to the trailer.

  ‘Are you ready to take her in, John?’ the security guard suddenly piped up.

  ‘Yes please, Keith,’ John shouted back.

  ‘Right you are.’ He spoke into a receiver on the wall. ‘Lift for John and Pollyanne coming onto stage.’

  John had meanwhile lowered the ramp and was climbing onto the trailer. ‘Jon, would you mind taking some of the chickens over to the lift?’ he said, handing me a crate containing two live chickens.

  Somewhat baffled, I did as I was told. Returning to the trailer, I could see that Pollyanne was getting impatient now, stomping and braying.

  ‘All right girl, I’m just coming,’ John assured her, handing over a second crate of chickens. ‘Jon, can you close up the trailer behind me?’

  He handed me the keys before climbing back onto the trailer, untying and leading Pollyanne down the ramp. It was such an incongruous sight that my brain could scarcely process the image I was seeing: a donkey trotting the streets of London. I lifted up the ramp to close and lock up the trailer and joined John in the elevator. This was already becoming an evening of firsts; I was now in a lift in the Royal Opera House, with four chickens and a donkey … It felt like the start of a joke. Keith shut the doors behind us and with the press of a button sent us on our way, up to the stage floor.

  The stage manager, dressed in black jeans and a T-shirt, complete with clipboard, a radio and earpiece, greeted Pollyanne warmly.

  ‘Here she is!’ she said, ignoring John and myself as she opened the elevator door. ‘I’ve missed you, Pollyanne.’ There was obvious affection in her voice as she rubbed Polly
anne’s mane. Pollyanne responded, with equal affection, nodding her head and nuzzling into the stage manager’s arm, but then she started sniffing her pockets for a treat. They clearly had an established routine. ‘OK, OK, here it is,’ she said, pulling out a carrot, which she grabbed before it was offered. ‘You only love me for my treats, don’t you, Pollyanne?’ she said with an air of pretend resentment. Greetings done, she turned her attention to us. ‘Evening, John. You’re in the same place as usual, let me know if there’s anything you need.’

  ‘Thank you, Emily. On top of things as ever, I see! Can I introduce you to Jon? He’s Pollyanne’s vet. He couldn’t miss her last season performing.’

  ‘Welcome, it’s a pleasure to meet you. I’m sure John will show you the ropes, but if there’s anything you need just let me know. Feel free to watch the performance from the wings. You’ll see some tape on the floor. Anyone past that line can be seen by the audience, so can I just ask you not to go beyond it at any time.’

  John stepped off the elevator platform leading Pollyanne, and I followed with one of the crates. As we came out from behind a black screen, a hive of activity greeted us and I realized we were actually already back stage. To the right of me was the stage itself, but the large forty-foot-high set panels blocked my view of it. The high ceiling was full of scaffolding on which the lighting rigs could be hung and moved. Cables ran along the floor in all directions, taped down at regular points to prevent people tripping on them. Messages, instructions or directions were chalked on the floor at various points. A lady attended to a rack of costumes and table of props. A multitude of people dressed in black like Emily were all busy at work on their various jobs. On this side, the back stage area was probably 15 feet wide. Halfway along it, a 6-foot by 6-foot pen had been erected, complete with straw bedding and a bucket of water. Next to it hung a rack with John’s costume. He opened the pen and Pollyanne sauntered in with an eager familiarity. The lady on the props table walked over to join us.