Interesting fact: Elephants are the only mammals that can’t jump.
Conservation: The IUCN lists African elephants as ‘vulnerable’: their 1979 population was estimated to be anything from 1.3 to 3 million; in 2012, this number had reduced to a mere 440,000 individuals – a decrease in the continental population of 66–85 per cent. Sadly, this decline shows no sign of stopping, with an estimated 100 elephants being slaughtered every day in Africa by poachers. At this rate, elephants will be extinct on that continent in just twelve years. Although populations are unsustainably diminishing in East Africa, in South Africa excessive numbers are leading to an increase in human–animal conflicts and habitat destruction for other wildlife. The charity Elephants Alive continues to do vital work in Southern Africa, striving to ensure the survival of elephants and their habitats, and to promote harmonious co-existence between man and elephants. For further information, and for ways to help the conservation of the African elephant, please visit www.elephantsalive.org.
7
CHICKEN
‘The key to everything is patience. You get the chicken by hatching the egg, not by smashing it.’
Arnold H. Glasow
When we first meet someone, so the theory goes, we only have a seven-second window to make a first impression. Given that we only get one chance at this self-portrayal, it is only natural that we desire to promote ourselves in such a way that those we meet recollect that first encounter with warmth and affection. If, for whatever reason, we fail at this, a lot of time and effort is required to alter a person’s initial perception of us. As a vet, to whom people entrust their animals, be they domestic or wild, pet or farmed, it is of the greatest importance to convey a responsible, knowledgeable and friendly professionalism from the very start.
No matter how hard we try, however, there are inevitably days when things conspire against us. The little girl’s hamster bites you as you carefully pick it up; the horse bolts past you when you open its stable; the farmer’s dog savages your leg as you get out of the car; the sat nav takes you to the wrong farm on the other side of the valley. Usually when this happens, you muddle through the awkward consultation, relieved when it is over, or jump back into the car and speed away at the first available opportunity. On occasion, though, the consultation or visit is more protracted, and then you sometimes have to steel yourself to endure one of the most awkward days of your life …
It was often said to me by older, wiser vets that farmers don’t suffer fools gladly – but why should they, when you are dealing with their livelihood? The general consensus within the veterinary profession is that you get one chance with them. If you do well, and the farmer likes you, then generosity will often flow abundantly: a joint of beef, a tray of eggs, a box of apples, home-baked scones, lunch or breakfast after the visit, or even an invitation for a day’s shooting. If it all goes badly, however, then prepare for an ear-bashing and to be rapidly escorted off the farm with the collies baying at your heels and forever after to read in the large appointments book ‘Any vet but Jon’ whenever that farmer requests a visit.
‘Jonny, I’ve booked you Mr Howard’s TB test for 8.30 a.m. on Monday,’ Jackie had said to me before she left work on Friday. ‘It’s a whole herd test so it’ll be about four hundred in total. I don’t think you’ve been there before, but it’s quite easy to find. He’s a lovely chap if he likes you, but can be quite a character if he doesn’t. I’m sure you’ll get on just fine.’
It was the usual routine. Jackie would let us know any pre-booked visits for Monday morning in advance so we could either go straight from home or make sure we were in the practice early enough to get organized before the visit. TB was so rife we were inundated with testing, so every vet had at least one large test to do a week, and mine were usually on a Monday. It was very mundane work, but often provided an opportunity to meet and bond with a new client or to find out how things were going with their farm. Having been qualified two years, the TB testing was second nature, so although a boring way to start the week, it wouldn’t require any weekend reading and I wasn’t on call, so I didn’t give the visit a second thought until Sunday night, when I calculated how much time I would need to get there in the morning.
Jackie had reckoned it would take twenty minutes to get to the farm and had given me her usual, precise directions. However, it was the first time I’d visited the farm and so to make sure I wasn’t late I decided to leave the practice by 8 a.m. I arrived at a quarter to, collected my equipment and paperwork and, content I had everything I needed, set off.
Jackie’s directions were, as usual, spot on. They took me straight to the farm without a problem, so with time in hand, I decided to pull into the layby in front of the farm to organize myself in the ten minutes I had before the appointment. Satisfied that I had all my equipment in order, I pulled out, drove the 200 yards to the large tarmacked entrance of Beech Farm, and proceeded down the driveway between the post-and-rail fencing. Jersey cattle grazed in the fields on either side of the driveway, which was about 100 yards long, and flanked by a dozen 20-foot-high leylandii cypress trees, growing in two groups of six, along both sides. They had presumably been planted to afford privacy to the modern red brick farmhouse at the end of the drive.
As I approached the row of evergreens, about 20 yards from the farmhouse, an eclectic flock of about twenty chickens, of all breeds and sizes, were sauntering across the driveway from my right to left, oblivious to my arrival. They were eagerly hunting out worms and grubs, pecking and scratching on the grass border in front of the fence line. Naturally I stopped to allow them time to pass. It seemed to take them an interminable amount of time to amble the short distance, despite my dog Max’s best efforts to hurry them along, barking at them from the passenger seat of my Isuzu Trooper. From my vantage point behind the wheel, my vision was slightly obscured, but at last I could see them all attentively scratching away in the dirt off to my left and so I continued on past the trees and pulled up in front of the house.
Turning off my engine, I stepped out of my car to put on my wellington boots and waterproofs. Walking round to the boot, something caught my eye back down beyond the row of leylandii: a commotion of feathers flapping and jerking all over the place. To my horror, I instantly knew what it was, as my mind flashed back to an incident from my childhood, when I had raised and cared for my own flock of thirty chickens. Occasionally, with an ill chicken or an unwanted cockerel that was fit to eat, I had humanely dispatched them as my father had taught me to do from a young age. On one occasion, though, after I had killed a cockerel, and immediately placed it in the utility-room sink to pluck and gut it for the freezer, the decapitated bird had suddenly jumped out of the sink, over my head, and proceeded to shower the utility room’s cupboards, walls and freshly laundered clothes in blood. The neural networks in the bird’s spinal cord stimulated exaggerated muscle movements that were no longer being regulated by messages from the brain. My mother had been out at the time, so I had desperately attempted to clean up the devastation before her return.
So now, with a sickening feeling in the pit of my stomach, I knew the flapping and convulsing was not the dance of some sexually charged male in pursuit of an unsuspecting member of his harem, but rather the death throes of their large, ornate, handsome cockerel. I walked as swiftly and casually as I could back to where the deceased cockerel was calming down, praying that by some miracle it was stunned rather than dead, and desperately hoping not to attract the attention of anyone in the farmhouse. However, with its large windows facing down the drive, I was certain I could sense Mr and Mrs Howard observing me intently from the warmth of their kitchen.