Rambo survives porcupine onslaught
2011-03-10
Lise Beyers
AN Alsatian called Rambo, recently lived up to his name when he tackled a porcupine against the slopes of Paarl Mountain. The incident was discovered last week, when young William Frater of Hou-moed Farm next to Jan Phillips Drive in Paarl South, went to greet all his farm friends early one morning. When he saw his dog covered in quills, he ran back into the house telling his mother that Rambo had been “stabbed a hundred times”. His parents, Yvette and Gerard, immediately ran outside to investigate. They were horrified to see the Alsatian impaled by almost 20 porcupine quills. One of the quills had penetrated barely a centimetre from Rambo’s eye, while another had gone right through a leg. He was covered in blood and it was unclear whether it was all his own, or whether some of the blood was that of the porcupine. A trail led Gerard to his bay-leaf plantation where he discovered the body of the large porcupine. He could not believe that after Rambo had been impaled by so many quills, that he had actually managed to kill the giant rodent. Rambo was taken to Paarl Animal Hospital and treated by Dr Emile du Plessis. The quills were carefully removed and he received various injections to prevent infection. Du Plessis coincidentally told the Fraters how he had last year also had a close encounter with a porcupine on Paarl Mountain. He and a group of cyclists had been out on an early morning ride on Paarl Mountain, when his bicycle suddenly struck something in the dark and he landed on the ground. Although the incident happened so quickly and the cause of the collision had vanished, clear traces of a porcupine remained. Du Plessis’s bicycle tyres had also been impaled by quills. But with Rambo’s return to his home last week after his ordeal, he was evidently not impressed to find that his prey had vanished. The porcupine had already been swept up by farm workers and turned into a tasty porcupine pie.
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