EST Donkey Sanctuary Work Exp

During summer 2012 I spent a week at the Elisabeth Svendson Trust Donkey Sanctuary (http://www.thedonkeysanctuary.org.uk/riding-therapy) in Sutton Park. This place is not only a sanctuary to 21 donkeys it also provides therapeutic rides for disabled children whom have physical, mental or both disabilities. 

 The rides teach the children how to care for the animals whilst learning to control them and also improve their reach and hand eye coordination. The children were sat on the donkey and led round a track with different obstacles and activities designed to stimulate all their senses. One activity involved the children reaching for a coloured bean bag then dropping it in the correct coloured bucket further round the track. They had to order the donkey to walk on and stop and were encouraged to sit correctly on the donkey.

The experience I got with these children and the amazing staff that work at the trust was priceless. I was allowed to help with the rides and taught how to talk to and behave around children with disabilities such as autism. It was not just the children I got to interact with, I was able to talk to the families of the children and tell them about the donkeys and what their names were. We were also visited by a mini bus from the local adult special needs home, I was told that they loved coming to watch the donkeys and loved watching me and another volunteer pick out the donkeys feet and help groom them. I really enjoyed working with the wide range of visitors at the sanctuary, grandparents would bring their grandchildren to see the donkey that they had sponsored and hearing about how it was getting on.

I’d never really worked around donkeys before so it was interesting to learn about them and their husbandry needs. It wasn’t the best weather in the week I was there and I was told that unlike horses, donkeys aren’t waterproof so when it rained all the donkeys scurried to the shelter of the trees or field shelter. I know their feeds and beds were pretty much the same as horses and they got the same sort of medical conditions. The donkeys were well cared for and a 7 stone weight limit for the riders was enforced to ensure the donkeys weren't overloaded.

There was an old donkey called Pascoe that wandered round the sanctuary doing as he pleased like he owned the place, he’s 33 years old and the most placid animal you’d ever meet. He had runny eyes occasionally and I was shown how to clean them for him. He also kept quidding his food and spitting it out so washed his mouth out to remove and stuck food and felt around to see if there were any sore spots but found nothing. He was the first donkey I practised picking out feet on because he was so well behaved, he’d had children grooming and fussing over him since he had been born so was well used to it. I helped with the usual mucking out and filling water butts up for the donkeys and helped with tacking them up ready for the rides.

I’ll definitely be returning to the sanctuary sometime soon to volunteer again because I loved the atmosphere everyone was lovely and I got a lot of people experience out of the short time I was there. If you ever find yourself with spare time, please go volunteer at your nearest EST donkey sanctuary!