Petlife Blog

Lucky, the luckiest duck in Wortham, Suffolk, hatched on December 2nd. He was found abandoned, with a leg tangled in brambles, half drowning in our pond on the morning of the 4th. He was bundled into a blanket and hurried into the warmth of our home and eventually made a full recovery from his ordeal. Since then, he has had a very posh little duck life, with warm baths and regular food on the table, inside our barn ‘town duck’. Last week, we noticed he had started spending more time outside during the day and has made a few mates on the pond now, whom he longs to see every morning. From ‘town duck’ he has become our ‘field duck’. Lucky knows his name and answers to it very well. When I say, "Quick, quick, quick!" he tends to come running to me. However, when he’s around his new pond mates, he acts like a teenager, ignoring me completely. It seems that I am cramping his style. When it gets dark, he comes happily inside when called and settles for the night on his Vetbed, in his utility room. He had a packet of dried worms for
Christmas, which he ate with greed and enjoyed his afternoon sleeping on a very full tummy. No need to say that he is very civilized in our white carpeted lounge, staying in his Vetbed, but showed some signs of mischief in my office last Tuesday, when the only way I could get him to stay quiet was to let him supervise my work from the top of his Igloobed! Photos don't show everything and I have to point out that he is changing his duckling peeping into a youngster's mid-quacking (not quite in tune yet). He is a superstar in Wortham, everybody has met him, but I wonder who will be teaching him to fly...?

By Dr Marie Bouvet

Often a thousand miles from the nearest vet. That’s the equivalent distance of London to Rome. Gary is living in a very remote and small Greenland settlement where 300 people live with 500 working sled dogs.

Welpi

“I go to extraordinary lengths to keep and eat myself healthy. I’ve the same dedicated attitude for my dogs’ diet too. I always want to watch my puppies grow from a healthy start. My kennel-breeding plan is long. Training my dogs is down to me. Quality supplement nourishment I leave to Welpi and administer it as a feed supplement to pregnant or nursing bitches and orphaned litters. I prefer winter litters. Coming into a cold polar dark world puppies potentially develop the best double-furred coats. By cold I mean minus 40°C.”

VETBED

“The Arctic is a world without trees or fields. It’s a logistical nightmare getting bedding like straw here. We have only two re-supply ships twice a year. Vetbed with its thick pile provides crucial insulating properties for my nursing bitches. Some synthetic furs tend to ice up offering no insulation in extreme cold, but not Vetbed. Wet combined with cold is a killer combination for litters of puppies. I cut to size and rotate my Vetbeds. They’re easily washed and dry fast."

For more about where Welpi and Vetbed have been with Gary: www.garyrolfe.com