Family's flood of Joy

A newborn foal in Australia is finding her feet after losing her mum and almost her life in the big wet. From nearly dead to pure delight, little Joy shares a cosy couch with a big teddy and a little mutt mate called Manny. Joy owes her life to strangers and Quest Equine Welfare president Rebecca Atkins. When found, she had either never stood or had fallen on trembling legs and was entombed in freezing cold mud, so caked in the quagmire that she couldn't even lift her head.

Wrapped in a blanket and rushed on the back seat of a car to the nearest open fireplace, Joy showed signs she might survive. Still less than a fortnight old and now living with Ms Atkins and daughter Elise at Inglewood, near Bendigo, Joy is getting stronger - and cheekier - by the hour. She shoves her head into the family fridge when it's time for her bottle of milk and frolics with two other dogs, both taller and twice as heavy as she is.She smooches up to cats Miffy and Willy, rubbing her cold nose into their fur.



Joy's right eye is ulcerated as a result of her head being left packed in mud. Time will tell if it heals or not. Dragging the Shetland foal from death's door has been hard work for Ms Atkins. "I reckon I've had about eight hours sleep in total for 10 days," she said. "She needs a bottle of mare's milk formula every 40-45 minutes, then a 30-minute nap then play and prance time, and then we go through it all over again."

At $270 a bucket of formula, the single mum who helped found the Quest horse and donkey rescue organisation is finding her smallest charge the most expensive. "It will be worth it if she survives because we can call her our greatest ever little miracle," Ms Atkins said. "The fact that her mother, who was more than half-starved herself, carried her through to term and gave birth to her before dying is just amazing. Talk about a mother's love."

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