RUBY Shorrock, 21, from Quarndon, a third-year student at Glasgow Veterinary School, worked at an Animal Aid Unlimited sanctuary in Udaipur, India, last summer. Here are extracts from her blog:
FIRST DAY AT THE SHELTER, SILAWATWARI, INDIA:
Went to the Animal Aid sanctuary for the first time. Erika and Clare, who run it, were really friendly and got us both settled in with the vet nurses.
My friend Amanda Budge – a fellow trainee vet – was in the large animal section with the cows and donkeys, many of which were paralysed or had amputations.
I went to the section I can only describe as maggot mayhem! There were about 40 dogs with wounds that had festered in the humidity and become infested with maggots. We cleaned all the wounds, which took us until around 1pm.
In the afternoon, Amanda and I fussed the dogs in "handicapped heaven". These dogs live at the centre in a special enclosure. They have been in accidents which have injured their spines. Most have no control of their back legs. They get around really well and love to be fussed.
One of the main problems for them is that they can't scratch themselves, but they combat this by grooming each other!
It was inspiring seeing how cheerful these dogs are despite their situation. They get physio every day and many of them learn to walk again.
DAY 2
Had an amazing second day! I was in the maggot wound section again. The wounds from yesterday look so much better.
The dog that we thought had no eye because his wound was so deep surprised us as we saw a healthy sparkling eyeball among the mess!
Sadly, both the new cases that came in today had to be put to sleep.
One had a massive head wound that had gone through to his brain and the other was totally emaciated.
DAY 15
Today has been busy! The foster mum of six pups has sadly got an infection so her milk is drying up.
One of the pups has died and another was at death's door when we arrived.
The vet nurse declared him dead but when I went over to see there was a flicker of life.
I rubbed him in a blanket and got him warm using a hot water bottle. I gave him 5ml of milk which took about 30 mins as I was being very careful because he had no sucking reflex.
I left him for two hours to warm up and when I came back he was a different puppy! He was warm and scoffed 7.5ml of milk.
We named him Rocky and we are hand-raising him.
