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Dogged devotion: Ellie the spaniel with her rabbit litter. |
| LONDON: When most dogs see a rabbit their reaction is to chase it down
the nearest hole. But in the case of Ellie the cavalier king charles spaniel, it brought out her motherly instinct. Ellie has "adopted" four orphaned rabbits found starving beside their burrow by her owner, Sara Reynolds. The dog is fiercely protective, cleaning and playing with them. When they are tired, they crawl under her fur to sleep. Ms Reynolds, 28, found the orphans, whose mother was probably taken by a fox, at the end of her garden in Lodsworth, Sussex. "They were so skinny," she said. "It was very sad, so I brought them inside. "The next day Ellie decided they were hers. |
"She hopped up on to the table where I was feeding them and curled up
beside them. She really is their surrogate mother now. "She won't let anyone near them, especially men." Because the rabbits are fed on goats' milk every two hours, Ms Reynolds has to take them to school, where she is a singing teacher, and Ellie insists on going too. The dog and rabbits are left in an empty classroom, then at breaktimes Ms Reynolds feeds them. "The arrival of the animals at school has caused quite a commotion," she said. "There is a lot of singing going on at the moment." |