Pollyanne turned out to be such a natural performer, in fact, that after being talent-spotted at an event, she was signed by a specialist agency providing animals for TV, film and theatre. Her first professional role was at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, starring alongside Plácido Domingo in I Pagliacci. On one notorious occasion she even upstaged him from the wings by braying noisily as he was singing one of his arias leading him to call her ‘a great scene-stealer’. Nevertheless, Pollyanne went down a storm, and so when a donkey was sought for Francesca Zambello’s 2006 production of Carmen to mark the sixtieth anniversary of the founding of the Royal Opera, Pollyanne was a natural choice.
Fast-forward nine years, and Pollyanne had appeared every year in the celebrated production of Bizet’s Spanish masterpiece, but 2015 was set to be its last run. Pollyanne had been so popular, among the cast and audience alike, that for her not to be able to perform in Carmen was unthinkable.
‘I think it’s her laminitis flaring up again, but it seems worse than normal,’ continued John. ‘I’ve tried to bring her into her stable from the paddock, but she’s so sore she doesn’t want to move.’
‘Poor Pollyanne! I’ve got a few things on this morning, but I could come out this afternoon about three o’clock. How would that suit?’
‘That would do nicely, thank you, sir.’
‘Great. Meawhile, give her half a sachet of painkiller and see if that makes her comfortable enough to bring her into her stable in an hour or so.’
As a result of her years of neglect, Pollyanne had periodically suffered from bouts of laminitis, a painful inflammatory condition of the tissues that bond the hoof wall to its pedal bone. Over the years John had learnt how to manage these flare-ups in her condition through a combination of painkillers, diet and a bed of deep shavings for a couple of weeks until things settled. However, they had occasionally been so bad that she required more intensive treatment, and it would take much longer for her lameness to fully resolve. If that was the case this time, there really was a genuine question as to whether Pollyanne would be healthy enough to make the two-hour lorry journey to the Royal Opera House in a couple of months’ time, so I fully understood John’s concern and prayed it wouldn’t be that serious.
It was a little before 3 p.m. when I drove down Old Didcot Road and turned into the donkey sanctuary. John was waiting as I pulled up at the gate into the yard, and he came striding over to open it. Then in his mid-seventies, he was still incredibly fit, but that was hardly surprising: he was a true worker, so passionate about his donkeys and other animals that to him his job was as pleasurable as a hobby. I was sure that in the thirty-two years since he had set up the sanctuary, he could count the number of days’ holiday he had taken on two hands.
As I got out of the car, he greeted me with his usual broad grin and firm handshake. Dressed in his customary heavy-duty black ankle boots, brown corduroy trousers, checked shirt, grey knitted V-neck sleeveless jumper and his faithful flat cap, he was ever the country gentleman, although his clothes, like his hands, told the same story of years of toil and hardship.
‘Good afternoon, sir. Thank you very much for coming.’
‘It’s a pleasure, John. Now, how is she?’
‘Oh, not very good … not very good at all.’
‘Did you get the painkiller into her, and did you manage to get her in from the paddock?’
‘I did, yes, she’s had half a sachet of Bute, and Linda and I managed to walk her in an hour ago, but she’s still incredibly sore.’
‘Let’s have a look at her then.’
We strolled over to the old ramshackle wooden barn next to the staff room, which was used as the infirmary. Full of cobwebs, with a pen for a sheep and goat, chickens nesting among four square straw bales, the odd farm cat peering out from behind a bag of corn, and a pile of baler twine and empty feed bags in the corner, it was an image of a forgotten time. For that very reason, it was my favourite place at the sanctuary and, of course, where I ended up spending the majority of my time.
Pollyanne was in the first of the two stalls. Despite the painkillers, and the deep straw bedding to cushion her feet, she was in obvious pain. Standing with her forelegs straight in front of her, resting her weight on her heels, she had the classic laminitic stance. There was none of the friendly, inquisitive nuzzling with which she usually greeted strangers as I stepped over the three-foot stainless-steel sheep fencing into her pen. Instead, her ears were down, and her eyes bulging, emphasizing the discomfort she felt.
‘I see what you mean, John. She really is struggling, isn’t she?’
‘It’s the worst I’ve seen her in eighteen years.’
Never one to exaggerate, John didn’t say that lightly. I bent down and felt for her digital pulses. They were pounding, and there was also noticeable heat in her hooves. I was keen to lift up her feet to have a look at her soles, but transferring further weight onto an already painful foot was something she firmly resisted and thus didn’t warrant the further distress it would have caused.
‘Yeah, it’s laminitis all right, and given how painful she is, I think we should X-ray her feet and make sure nothing catastrophic is going on in that hoof.’
‘Whatever you suggest,’ John replied.
‘I could borrow our practice’s machine, but I won’t be able to get back out with it again until Thursday at the earliest, so I think it’s best if I refer her so we can get the ball rolling as soon as possible.’
If her pedal bone was rotating and slipping through the hoof, then Pollyanne’s condition was extremely serious and would need intensive remedial work by a farrier to address the problem. The only way of accurately assessing whether there was any rotation, and if so how much, was by X-raying the feet. It was a simple job, but because she was in so much pain, she was unfit to travel and so the X-raying would need to be done at the sanctuary, and this required a portable machine. There was a very good equine specialist hospital not far away and they had a very experienced farrier who would be able to manage her feet and give her the best chance of a speedy recovery.
‘I’ll give them a call now,’ I explained to John, ‘and see if someone can come out to X-ray her feet this afternoon. Then we can take it from there. In the meantime I’ll give her a sedation and some more pain relief and put some temporary cushioning pads on the bottom of her feet. Hopefully that’ll help her a little.’
Returning to my car, I made the call, grabbed some bandage material and soft supportive pads, and drew up a couple of injections, which I then administered. After a few minutes Pollyanne was sleepy enough for us to lift each front foot in turn so I could bandage the cushioning in place. Ten minutes later the job was done.
‘I’m much obliged to you,’ said John, handing me a coffee. ‘You know what Pollyanne means to me. They’re all special, of course, but I’ve never had a donkey like her … She really is a special one, all right.’
‘Someone will be out between about five and five thirty this afternoon,’ I reported, taking a sip.
‘Very good, very good. Thank you.’
‘They’ll let me know what they find, and then we’ll take it from there. I can come back out in due course to check on her, but they’ll probably manage her from here on.’