Three of the Beastly Beasts gave blood today, and yes, I'm proud of them.

As Monty mentioned, they were at White Lodge last week, and on picking them up yesterday I made an offer to Claire - no, not that kind of offer - Kai has more on that in a bit. Anyway, seeing as it invloved a trip back to WL today we were invited to a blood giving session.



Pet Blood Bank UK is a relatively new charity whose goal is to provide a blood bank for pets in the UK (the clue is in the name) so that when other animals need a transfusion there are blood cells and plasma available. They are based in Loughborough, and right now operate within a 2 hour drive from there due to time contraints in getting the blood back to the lab, but aim to expand the operations nationwide. Today they were at White Lodge - as were the Beastly Beasts.

The actual procedure is pretty much the same as when us humans give blood. To start with the potential donor gets the once over to make sure they are fit and well, and the human gets to fill in a form; a blood sample is then taken which goes off for blood typing and checking; then a patch on the neck is shaved so a vein can be found for the needle to go into; the skin is swabbed to sterilize (this has to be redone if someone sticks there fingers on the skin - doesn't it Claire?) and anesthetise it; then the needle goes in an blood comes out. As with humans, about a pint is taken.

One big difference from us humans is that dogs make up their blood in a matter of days, and can donate three or four times a year.

The actual donation takes about 10 to 15 minutes - unless your Kai (I'll explain why in a bit).

Afterwards a dressing goes on for a bit, and each one gets a bandanna, a tag, and a chew.

Below are photos of it all going on, so if you're dead squeamish stop now!!

First up was Troy. In his inimitable style he made friends with Wendy and Craig by leaning on them. He passed muster on his health check (though we did discover he has two chips), as did Kai and Monty, and was soon on the table being bled.


Troy giving blood

The actual donation requires four participants - the most important is of course the donor themselves, next is the person that holds the needle in place, and there are two others to pet the dog and keep them still; though other than when Gary opened the fridge door and food was potentially on offer, none of the Beasts moved very much at all.


Needle in the neck

Second in was Kai, and I must admit I thought he would not be too happy about it. On the contrary, he virtually fell asleep while he donating, and took ages to give his pint because he was so relaxed!!


Shaving the neck

As far as I could tell, none of the Beasts were afraid of the needles, unlike one of the humans; note which way Claire is looking in the following pic!!


Inserting the needle

Monty was the last of the Beasts, and in contrast to Kai was a quick bleeder.

So did they suffer any ill effects? No. Here they all are a few minutes after their donations, and as you can see, severly traumatised - NOT!!

Troy


Kai


Monty


Blood Donor Beasts

So why only three of the Beasts? Jack is on antibiotics at the moment, so that was him out - he caught a few rays instead -


Jack snoozing in the sun

and Maple, being 8 in a few weeks, is too old.

Here's all the Beasts with Craig and Wendy.


Craig, Wendy and the Beastly Beasts

The numerate among you will notice that there are six Beasts in the photo - more about that from Kai in the next post.

We were more than happy to help today - Pet Blood Bank UK is something that is much needed, so please give them your support if you can - who knows, it might be your pet that needs blood one day. There's loads more about them and what they do on their website - please take a look.