Worldwide Veterinary Service

Arriving at Rosemarys’ house after 2 days of flights, airports and a rather un-relaxing night in Lima (dragging our bags around in the rain looking for a hostel that wasn’t already full!), felt like home from home. I had luckily managed to find the other two, Marisol and Becca, at various airports en route (with a little guesswork!). We were instantly made to feel comfortable and welcome. We were introduced to her menagerie of dogs and cats- or rather, they inroduced themselves!(they are probably the happiest pets in Peru!)and shown around. Our accomodation was a gorgeous little room with 3 beds in a compound that had a shower and toilet unit, a little kitchen (used to sterilise kits!), and backing onto this were some more dogs and cats from the shelter who we grew to know and love. In particular, we became immediately acquainted with Bobby, whose unfortunate fate was to be sedated to have a bath- sedated because personal hygiene wasn’t really top of his to- do list (as you could tell by his general skankyness!). All the animals, including some random tortoises (!) were looked after by More, who lived next door so was always on hand to keep tabs on what they were up to! The shelter is a minutes walk from the little beach, and the sunsets were beautiful (despite being at 6pm!). The dogs sometimes would accompany us on these trips and spend the entire time catching and eating crabs whilst dodging the tide! Amy (the resident vet volunteer) and Rosemary gave us a guided tour and update on how everything was done, and the next day work was underway. Marina (who was possibly superwoman on the quiet!) managed to find at least 10animals for us to do everyday, with the aid of a few dog crates and a taxi! The clinic was well equipped (even a bit luxurious..!) with 3 op tables, drips, and storage for drapes and medicines. The nicest thing was knowing that, even though most of the animals we did were unloved ,unwanted and some had health problems, that at least by neutering them they would be unable to bring more unwanted puppies into the world. Amy was good at organising us all, and keeping calm in the odd bleeding bitch spey crisis, and Ingrid the resident vet and Marina were so lovely to work with, despite my complete inadequacy in Spanish! Our spirits were kept up by Marisol and Becca, on the random couple of evenings where we were still doing kits/ washing drapes at a rather late time of night after a glass of wine! For 2 separate days we went out to local villages to spey and neuter there, which was good, Becca and Amy managed to get a lot of donkeys and horses wormed, whilst Ingrid, Marisol, Marina’s daughter and I operated all day in someones front room! At the first village, the owner of one dog insisted on taking her bitch’s uterus home with her to show the children- no doubt there were due for a ‘facts of life’ lecture, bless them! All the organising couldn’t have been done without Rosemarys friends and colleauges like Charlie and Noet who both ensured everything ran smoothly on our trips out to the villages. Rosemary’s neighbour cooked us wonderful lunches and dinners, and sometimes Rosemary cooked too which was delicious and usually resulted in me eating 2 peoples worth of Peruvian food each night. We had a few sad cases- dogs with distemper, and one RTA puppy that the owners had decided to not treat, as the initial treatment for shock perked it up no end despite its fractured femur. They went against Marisol and Rosemarys advice to take it to the nearest town to get it fixed. We were all very sad when it came back a few days later, very sick, with a ruptured bladder, and needed to be put down. In spite of this, it was good to be neutering animals, as even the few we did will spread the word. Noe also spent time educating local children on village trips, and I always think, there will be at least one in the group who will think, ” yeah, I get that, that’s a good idea!”.