More Precious Than Gold
Just one of many everyday sanctuary tales, told by Carole herself.
It was a cold February night. I had just come indoors for a coffee to prepare for another long, tiring
night. The telephone was ringing. I was tempted to let the
answer-phone take it, but decided to take it myself.
"Is that the Farm Animal Rescue Sanctuary?" a voice said
at the other end. My spirits rose, as I had put some ads in the
local papers for donations to help boost our ever decreasing finances.
"Yes!" I said, with hopeful anticipation. "I don't know if you're
interested," the voice went on, "but we have thirteen lambs that haven't
sold and they must go this week."
Must go, of course, means only one thing, so
although our Sanctuary was already bursting at the seams with over 400
sheep, and I was working 20 hours a day, I told the voice I would meet
him next day, and early the following morning I was en route on my 160
mile round trip to collect the babies.
|
 |
We met in a car park and I was dismayed at how
very thin and poorly-looking my new charges were. Conversation
between me and their late owner was at a minimum and within a short
time, I was hurrying them home to the Sanctuary.
The first thing I did was to tuck them up under heat
lamps and give them a special drink, but they were obviously very ill
and required special attention. The vet came round and examined
them, taking blood and other samples; the next two weeks were simply a
nightmare. I had them on saline drips in my bedroom, but I was
losing them one by one. I was devastated! What was I doing wrong?
Why were they dying? Then came the awful diagnosis - they had
Salmonella. I was told I would be lucky to save even one of them!
Yet I felt I couldn't give up, that I had to give them every possible
chance of life, however short. And, at the end of a depressing and
exhausting time, I managed to save three, which the vets thought was a
miracle.
..every time she took any solid food, she choked
But one of my new lambs had another problem which I wasn't aware of
until she began eating hay - a severe narrowing of the throat which
meant that every time she took any solid food, she choked, sometimes for
an hour or even more. My only immediate recourse was to lift her
up, tilt her this way and that, and even upside down in a desperate
effort to clear her airways. This seemed to work at times, but
there were also occasions, dreadful occasions, when she stopped
breathing entirely and I had to revive her with the kiss of life.
I then, of course, made sure that hay or anything similar was kept
strictly away from her, and gave strict orders to my family and friends
never to drop any morsels of hay which the lamb might find in her
peregrinations about the house - for she was still too scrawny a bundle
to let outside. What she seemed to love very much was sleeping on
my bed, and it was delightful having her lying near to me.
Inevitably, I gave her the name by which she had endeared herself to me
- Precious. The other two lambs, Angel and Pebbles, recovered very well
and went out to join all their new friends in the field and the barn.
Now, eighteen months later and after two life-saving operations at
the veterinary college, plus countless sleepless nights for me, my
Precious is a fine, growing young sheep. Although nothing
medically can be done for her problem in taking solid foods like hay,
she must be the only sheep who lives on baby food, because this is the
only nourishment she can cope with and gain weight. And, because
of her digestive problems, she has to be burped just like a baby after
she's taken her baby food.
|
