Looking After A Donkey, by Dorothy Morris

One of the odd quirks of reading multiple books about the same subject is the way that one can see the approaches that are taken to a given subject by various writers.  This particular book, for example, looks at how one would take care of a donkey in England.  It notes the very limited options one has for breeding (as well as veterinary care) in the country as well as pumps the Donkey Breed Society, of which the author was a founding member and an honorary Vice President, and also discusses the way in which Britain’s weather can be a challenge for taking care of donkeys for whom dry feed is of the utmost importance.  The book is also rather cautious when it comes to encouraging people to make money out of donkeys, presumably because the market for donkeys is so small in England that one cannot profit from selling to the few people there who want to have donkeys for themselves.  One must instead have donkeys for one’s own interest, and the book does a good job at showing what would be interesting about having donkeys and what they have to offer as pets as well as work animals.

This particular book is a short one of about 150 pages or so and it is divided into 33 short chapters, some of them only about a paragraph long.  The book begins with an introduction and then discusses such matters as choosing a donkey (1), conformation (2), buying (3) and settling in one’s donkey (4), issues of land (5), shelter (6), food (7), tack (8), insurance (9), grooming (10), exercise (11), and training (12).  The author then moves on to discuss matters of carrying, riding, and driving (13), showing (14), teeth (15), feet (16), parasites (17), health troubles from ear to tail (18), and general donkey troubles (19).  The author discusses the pros and cons of having a foal (20), as well as special issues concerning brood mares (21), stallions (22), and studs (23), as well as how one prepares for a foal (24), which leads into discussions about the in-foul mare (25), the foal about to give birth (26), the birth of a foal (27), the newborn foal (28), and the growing foal (29), as well as the weaning of a foal (30).  Finally, the book discusses hand-rearing of foals (31), which happens when a foal is orphaned or rejected by its mother, as well as how one takes care of the elderly donkey (32) and how to deal with parting (33), after which the book ends with an index.

In reading this book it was rather interesting what sort of matters the author focused on.  Besides pumping up the organization she was a part of, the author seemed most interested in dealing with the health problems that donkeys faced as well as the issues of breeding donkeys.  Those readers who want to keep geldings and aren’t interested in breeding will find that a great deal of this book is interesting but not necessarily essential to taking care of one’s donkey.  All in all, though, this book does a good job at encouraging a reader to take care of donkeys and reminds readers that there are a lot of ways in which one must be careful in feeding donkeys and in making sure that they stay healthy.  By and large donkeys appear to be animals whose health requires frequent maintenance but which reward the owner with a great deal of curiosity, a certain sense of stoicism, and verve and personality.  I know the sort of donkeys that I have seen tend to encourage someone to take care of them and I hope that they are a more common animal in the future for people to take care of then they are now as they have a lot to offer.