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The Vet at the End of the Earth: Adventures with Animals in the South Atlantic
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It's the Paradise Podcast. I am your host, Ryan Michelle Bathe with my husband Sterling. What's up? Join us here on Hulu and Hulu on Disney, where we'll discuss each episode with the cast and crew of Paradise. I'll be getting all the secrets from Dan Fogelman, James Marsden, Shailene Woodley, Julianne Nicholson and Sterling Kelby Brown. Paradise, the official podcast is now streaming and stream paradise on Hulu and Hulu on Disney. Hi everyone. I want to tell you all about another podcast I think you'll enjoy. College Matters from the Chronicle College Matters is a weekly show from the Chronicle of Higher Education, and it's a great resource for news and analysis about colleges and universities. You'll hear sharp discussions with Chronicle journalists offering fresh perspectives on the latest salvos from the Trump administration and keen insights about how faculty and students are adapting to technological changes. College Matters also features incisive interviews with newsmakers, including recent conversations with Chris Eisgruber, Princeton University's president, and Rick Singer, who is best known as the mastermind of the Varsity Blues admissions scandal. Check out College Matters wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome to the New Books Network.
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A
Hello everyone, and welcome to Academic Life. This is a podcast for your academic journey and beyond. I'm the show's producer and host, Dr. Christina Gessler, and today I am pleased to be joined by Dr. Jo Hollins, author of Vet at the End of the Adventures with Animals in the South Atlantic. Welcome to the show, Joe.
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B
Thank you, Christina.
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A
I am so glad that you're here and that we're going to dive into this book. It has so many stories and I know we'll only be able to cover a few, but before we do that, will you please tell us about yourself?
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B
Yeah, sure. I'm a British veterinary surgeon. I qualified in 1984 from Cambridge University, and after working a couple of years in general practice in the uk, I went worked to Africa, actually to work in Zimbabwe in South Africa, and then came back to the UK to work in practice again for a while. But then an opportunity arose to fill in for a friend down in the South Atlantic on the Falkland Islands, one of the British overseas territories, and I took that up and it led Me down a completely new path.
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A
A completely new path. When you were in vet school, did you have any idea that you could end up working on the other side of the world from where you were starting?
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B
Yeah, in a way I did because I had two years off before going up to university and so I traveled around the world. I took a ship to Australia and got a job as a jackaroo. And you might not know what that is, but that's. They sometimes call them rouseabouts, farm worker, in effect. But they have big farms, of course. It was 600 miles in land in Queensland on a 300,000 acre ranch and there they call that small. In the Northern Territory, they start measuring in square miles. We had 30,000 sheep and 3,000 head of cattle, all very nice round figures. And it was 35 miles long. And that was a terrific education for me. It was quite brutal as well, from a veterinary point of view, which I wasn't then. The welfare issues out in the outback are quite, quite heavy. But then, you know, they're practical people. I imagine it's a little bit like the. Some of the farming in, in the deeper part of America, really. They have to just get on with it. And I, and I worked on two farms in New Zealand as well. So in fact I was destined to study economics at Cambridge University and it's a leading school of economics and I did actually go up there to do that and I always wanted to be a vet and it was really because I was more or less derailed by the careers advisor at school. And you take their advice, you know, they said, you should go in the City, I think, because that's what my brother was doing and he was older than me, but I wasn't happy with that. And particularly after working on, on those farms overseas, I had the itch to work overseas and I thought, well, I can channel my energies into perhaps third world development economics, it was called third world then, but developing nation economics, and particularly agriculture, which is my interest. And after a year up at university, I was rowing for my college, Emmanuel College, Cambridge, in the first eight with three vets in the eight in the crew of eight. And they were good friends and they kept on saying, why didn't you try and change to vet? You want to be a vet, be a vet. And I was very frustrated. I wanted to be a vet, so I had to leave Cambridge and take extra exams because over here you need three science A levels. That's the sort of pre exam, pre university exams. You need three science A levels to satisfy what's called the first mb. Basically be a doctor or a vet. And I had one. I had maths, I had maths, geography and economics, in fact. So I, I left Cambridge University, went to College of Further Education down in Devon at Plymouth, and in six months, and their two year courses, it was cramming. I took two science at A levels, which was chemistry and biology, and went back to Cambridge and did the full six year veterinary course up there. So, yes, I always had a yen to work overseas as a result of my traveling. Not because the UK isn't enough, but because I think really the world fascinates me. We're one species that live and work and operate in so many different ways around the world with different, you know, cuisines and creeds, religions, architecture and along with that, landscapes, topography and, you know, seaports and history, which molds and fashions the places you visit. So I was trying to combine my professional tag with, with my, my yen for travel.
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A
You had such a determination to become a vet.
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B
Yes, I, I did actually.
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A
Did that start when you were young? What, what, what put it inside you that this is really who I am and what I'm interested in?
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B
See, see, that's a good question. You don't really know your parents are eccentric until you grow up and look back a bit. And they were eccentric. They bought a really fascinating property called the Moat House. It was a tumbledown original quarryman's cottage that the Victorians then built a tyre on with a coat of arms. It had a dry moat, it had line kilns, it had a tunnel going through to a river and had a dungeon as well and an ice well. So it was really a fascinating place. And because of that it was surrounded by forest and we had a big courtyard. We had always had four dogs. We, you know, topped them up when one last passed on. We had lots of cats and chickens and geese and buds, everything really. And so I was brought up pretty much as one of the animals by my parents, I think, and I've always loved animals and obviously I, because of that, I did always want to be a vet. So I did get derailed by the careers advisor because he told me that's what I should be doing to go into the city or something like that. But anyway, I managed to correct the error.
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A
But your brother went to the city, so you were destined to go one way or the other, it sounds like.
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B
Yes, he did a famous course up at Oxford University called Politics, Philosophy and Economics, which several of our Prime Ministers have done and several leading politicians. And then Went to work for Marks and Spencer's in London and then in France and, you know, Ireland. So it's a completely different direction. He's not really scientific at all and certainly not medical. So we're two different strands of the same rope.
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A
And so you finished vet school, it sounds like in the book, you did work in England for a bit and you had a rather dismal job in a slaughterhouse.
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Well, yes and no, actually, I got a job with an excellent practice, a very good practice. I was lucky to be offered it, really. Bainbridge and Butt in Wellingborough. That won't mean much to people, but they both the partners, Robert Bainbridge and John Bart, were leading lights in the veteran profession. John in the pig world and Robert in the horse world. And we had all the species, which, as a newly qualified vet, is what you really need to do. You learn a lot of theory at university and you see practice with vets, you get some practical experience, but of course, there's nothing like hardening your knowledge off with the real experience when you're having to stand on your own two feet. So we had, you know, a lot of horses because of Robert, pigs and sheep, goats, dogs and cats. We had a whole town to ourselves, all the pairs. But you're right, unfortunately, really, because it's not what I like doing. There was very good money to be made for the practices by providing a veterinary surgeon for the local abattoir, and the money was paid by the government. They basically employed, or rather paid for a vet in a local private practice to go down to the abattoir and stamp the carcasses and obviously monitor for correct hygienic practices. In fact, they had the ability to close down the abattoir and it was. It was just one week in four. But it wasn't on my job description when I took the job. And it's one of the things that sort of drove me away, really, because we were sorting about a thousand lands a day and I would have to go into the chiller and stamp them four times, buttock, buttock, shoulder, shoulder with my EU stamp, as well as go around bossing everybody about regarding their knife cleanliness and the knife sterilizers and. And, you know, the contamination of carcasses and that sort of thing. And I was more, much more interested, always have been, in diagnosis, anesthetics and, you know, pathology and microbiology and parasitology. They really do fascinate me. And I love particularly pursuing a diagnosis because it's detective work. Animals don't talk of Course, it's a little bit like Pediatrics in that respect, so. So you have to take all the clues you can get from the patient, but also by taking a very accurate history from the animal owner in Pediatrics, that would be the parents. And I love that process of deduction. They can't just say, oh, I've got this little pain here at my left flank, and it comes and goes. But it's worse in the morning, instead you having to deduce exactly what's going on.
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The book opens with you in the South Atlantic on an island, and you have care of a rather famous patient, a 200-year-old tortoise named Jonathan. And you. You get a call that's worrisome, that perhaps something dreadful has befallen Jonathan. Can you take us to that scene in the book, please?
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Yes. Jonathan is very special. He's the oldest known living land animal in the world, and he's in the Guinness World Records as such. And that's because we have documented proof. He was landed in on the island of St. Helena in the South Atlantic in 1882, fully grown. And we've taken that as 50 years, which the leading authorities say is very fair. He could have been 70 or 80, actually, so we age him at 192 at the moment, but he could be over 200. So he's an icon. He's very important. He attracts tourists. Everybody wants to see Jonathan. He's a wonderful, fascinating, giant Seychelles tortoise. Beautiful. He's got cataracts, he's lost his sense of smell. His hearing, though, is excellent. And he's a gentleman of a tortoise. So I get this dreaded phone call that he's dead. And he lives in a paddock. They call it the paddock. Not very imaginative. But in front of the glorious East India Company House, Plantation House, which is where the Governor actually lives. It's the seat of the Governor, so it's a beautiful setting. And a jogger phoned in to say that he was sprawled out on the ground. It's difficult for a tortoise to sprawl, of course, but he was sprawled out, legs out, neck out. They got very long necks for reaching up into strawberry and that he was clearly dead. So, of course, my heart sinks. This is a tragedy. Now, we do actually have a plan prepared for his death, like all celebrities, called Operation Go Slow. And, you know, we would celebrate his life, his death. And there was going to be a day of. A day off work, actually, so people could, you know, enjoy remembering Jonathan, because He's got a long history on the island now. He's an icon, you know, he's a, he's a symbol of resilience and endurance as, as wars have raged and come and gone, as empires have come and gone, as king and queens have come and gone, epidemics have come and gone. He's been there since, well, hatched, hatching probably in 1832 or before, but he's been in St. Helena from 1882. So terrible news. And I dashed down there to find he was indeed spread eagled on the lawn of plantation, just, just dead still. His legs, quite long legs and they're like elephant legs. They really are trunks, you know, solid like tree trunks. They were out horizontally like fallen pillars of a temple. His neck, very long neck, very snake like, covered in scales, were stretched right out and his eyes were closed. And I really thought, this is it, what a tragedy. And I felt sad but. Well, perhaps I shouldn't give too much away, but the first chapter reveals what he was really doing.
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A
You also take us into his care when you arrive. There were times when he didn't seem to be feeding well and you had to make some decisions that sort of go against training to go once a week and feed him so that you could see if you could help him regain some of his vitality. Can you talk to us about what it's like to take care of him?
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B
Yeah, it's very interesting actually. I've always been interested in tortoises in the uk. They're Mediterranean tortoises, but. And they're hibernating species, but of course I'd never had to deal with giant tortoises, but I have to say, obviously they're very similar in that respect. They're still. They're a large version of the small ones. When I first went there, he was to me clearly dying. His beak, we do call it a beak. It should be really sharp with scythe like ridges on it. It's made of keratin, same substance that horn and hoof is made of. But the sharp edge should just scythe grass nice and easily. But because it was blunt and crumbly, of course he was starving and actually turned out to be a vicious circle. These giant tortoises are a subject of much research and they are in fact in effect quasi immortal, which is quite fascinating. They repair their genes, particularly the genes called the methylone, which are the controller genes that we oxidize and methylate through life and sometimes through bad habits and through pollution and toxins. And for us that leads us down the sticky path of cancers and endocrine disorders, you know, hormonal disorders in older age. But the tortoises are really good at repairing these genes as well as the ends of their chromosomes which are called telomeres. They're a little bit like the aglets, the little plastic bits on the end of, on the ends of your shoelaces that stop them fraying. And again, our telomeres tend to fray and obviously that leads into trouble. So they're a subject of much research. And actually over in the States there, the Vanderbilt Medical Research center, who were greatly involved in developing the Moderna vaccine for Covid, I think, financed by Dolly Parton, based in Nashville, Tennessee, are researching this quasi immortality and that their aim really is to research why tortoises are so resistant to cancers. They're cancer dogs. They've got his genome. I swabbed his mouth with great difficulty and they established his genome, which is fantastic. And they've researched it and they're about to publish some pretty major papers on it. So he's fascinating in that respect. But anyway, when I went there, he was looking as if, you know, it was over. Because he was blind as well. He was. I observed him eating soil, eating air, eating dry leaves, anything really. He was just biting randomly, he couldn't smell or see. So I started hand feeding him once a week really to boost his calories. And of course, if I'd thought a little bit more laterally, I would've realized he was also very deficient in those wonderful drivers of our crazily complicated metabolism. That's vitamins, minerals and trace elements. So by feeding him once a week, he's suddenly rejuvenated and they have it in their power to do that. So his beak came back, he put on weight, he became younger, basically, really quite fascinating. He's also a species that was considered to be extinct. We know now that it's no longer a species. DNA testing has relegated many species to breeds or subspecies. But he's a rare breed for sure, considered to be extinct. And his species or breed was rediscovered searching collections around the world. And now they're trying to breed up his, his particular subspecies, which is the Seychelles giant tortoise. The commonest tortoise is the Aldabra giant tortoise from the Aldabra Atoll in the Indian Ocean. So he has been de. Extincted, rejuvenated, and he's quasi immortal. And I always say to people those are superpowers. Superpowers we don't have, you tell us
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A
in the book that at times students come out to study and to learn. What is it like to be in such a remote place and training students?
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B
Yeah, it is limiting, to be fair, the, what we call the tyranny of isolation, which includes limited resources and limited access, of course, to research laboratories and analytical laboratories, means that in a way it puts you more on your toes analytically, which is I like. It's challenging, but it can also be frustrating. So when students come out, I warn them that they're not going to see the in depth, thorough biochemical investigations of conditions that we can easily do here in the UK and in the States just by sending samples off to a laboratory, usually getting the results the next day or after a couple of days. In fact, I would have to rely on the hospital laboratory who are very helpful, but obviously they're just running blood tests for humans, some of which or most of which are appropriate, but they don't run all those other complicated tests that we sometimes need. So yeah, I think it's an eye opener because students can take it for granted. Working in our developed nations, everything is at hand. And it's a good lesson to know that for much of the world, if not most of the world, everything is not at hand. And you actually had to use your internal resources to work out a case or to establish what conditions are on the island. Which is one of the things I was doing was basically researching what was there on the island so that we knew for all time, creating a database, something we could refer to for information after I'd gone and I've done that. So it also makes you research. Instead of sending lots of samples off to a laboratory for worm counts or blood smears and stuff like that, I would do them myself. I do worm egg counts, I do blood smears, stain them, have a look and even do fine needle aspirate biopsies. That's, that's taking a biopsy of a tumor, making a smear and having a look under a microscope. I'm not a pathologist, but you use books who have a napkos of pathology and you extend your knowledge. So I think it's an education for students really to, to realize that it's just not all gold plated ready, easy at hand facilities that sometimes you have to really apply yourself and think a bit more laterally and a bit more deeply. This episode is brought to you by State Farm. Listening to this podcast. Smart move. Being financially savvy.
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A
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B
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A
Stitch Fix Shopping is hard.
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B
Let's talk about it. I don't have time to shop for clothes. I have to buy everything in three sizes to find one that fits. They know me at the post office. Workout wear is my only wear.
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A
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A
Today@stitch fix.com you give us an example of a cow surgery that you do in less than sterile conditions with your students. It's in a section that I believe you call Not All Fluffy Bunnies, where you really are giving the students a practical look at life outside a typical veterinary practice. And you, you end up saving this cow's life, which must have been really meaningful to everybody who was there. But it was a very harrowing part of the book to read and not know how it was going to turn out. Can you, can you tell us about that, please?
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B
Yes, without. Without preventing people eating their dinner or anything like that. It's. It's included in the book to illustrate really, as. As hinted at in the title, that it's not all fluffy bunnies. The reality of some of the cases is pretty gruesome. And in fact, in truth, in that particular case, I'd call that a salvage procedure because we saved the cow, but we lost the calf. Obviously, in the ideal world, you save both, but it's better than losing both, which can also, of course, happen. So this was a very tricky carving. It was pouring with rain, it was across a boggy valley, so we're knee deep in mud as well. Is quite high in altitude on, on St. Helena. And worse, this cow was wild. So, you know, we get used to domesticated cattle in countries like the uk, but in, in areas where they're ranched, which of course you'll be familiar with in, in, in the us they're not really that domesticated. And this cow was lethal. She was brutal and lethal, but the farmer had done very well at tethering her between two trees to stop a front end moving around too much. But the back end, of course, contains the hind legs and they can kick incredibly powerfully. It was just as well. It was Boggy, because she had trouble doing that. Well, there was a dead calf and it was just head out and they should dive out with the four legs first and the head nestled on the legs, with the head only out and dead, unfortunately, the head swells up and there's just no room, no access. So you might think that's a cesarean. But of course, if you can get the calf out without doing the cesarean, that's, that's going to be better for the cow. And gruesomely, the way to sort that is to cut the head off, which I did. And then you can actually get your arm in and sort out the legs, bring the legs forward and put ropes on them, which we did. But I did this with an epidural, an injection of anesthetic into just at the base of the tail. And that, that means that she's not in pain. And if you get the dose just right, they don't fall down either. And partly because of that, partly because she was wild, partly because she'd been in labor for a long time, and partly because she was on a steep slope. No sooner had I managed to get the calf out than her womb came out. This is a prolapse. And a cow's womb is enormous. And unfortunately, once it comes out, it starts swelling up like leavening dough. You know, it won't go back in again in theory. But there are tricks. And obviously, as a vet, your heart sinks when you've done all this work. The weather conditions are terrible, and then suddenly you've got another major task on your hands. But there is a way of doing it. You get them down, you frog leg them, and it creates. That's pulling the hind legs out behind them. And in this case, every reader was sitting on top of her as well because she was very fractious. You wash it off and by frog legging them, you create a sort of internal suction, which helps, but the thing is too big as well. So you wrap it up and you lean against it with all your might and squeeze. And you have to be. Be patient too. You can't hurry it. You work it, work it, work it. And over 10, 15, 20 minutes, it slowly gets smaller and in it goes. It suddenly goes in, usually, and then you have to re. Extend it on the inside. And colleagues have been known to use wine bottles to do that because the move is big. I know it sounds very obscure, but you can't leave the horns inside out like a. Like a sock you pulled off. You've got to re invert everything so we did all that, and then I stitched it in as well, because I was not going back to that cow to do it again later that evening. So you put stitches in so that she can still weave, and those stitches stay in just for a few days. By that time, the womb had shrunk down. But I think it demonstrates, really, that it's not all fluffy bunnies.
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A
In the book, we. We learn about what it's like to raise sheep on these islands, what. What it's like to have cows, that the animals are not the barnyard stories we might have read as children, that these are. These are very different conditions, but we're also introduced to animals we would not dream, would live there. Can you tell us about the reindeer and how they came to be there?
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B
The reindeer are fascinating. In fact, it's the best thing I've done in my career. So, just to clarify, I've worked on four of the British Overseas territories in the South Atlantic. I've just been talking about St. Helena, which is in the tropics, and a very small island which was the base of the East India Company, the Honorable East India Company, who weren't so honorable. And I also worked on Ascension, which is north of there, a military base where America has a very big say, actually, in a base and an airstrip. And also in the Falkland Islands, what are known in Argentina and South America as Islas Maldinas, the Falkland Islands down in sub Antarctic waters, plus a year in Tristan da Cunha, which despite its name, is also British. You know, we were rather good at taking islands from Portuguese. That applies to St. Helena as well, by the way. And so the reindeer. The reindeer were in the Falklands. And the story behind it goes back to Chernobyl, really? Well, no, it goes back further. It goes back to the Norwegian whalers who set up whaling stations in South Georgia, another British overseas territory. It still is. South Georgia is down further south in the Falklands and further east as well. Beautiful, pristine wilderness. But it became the center of whaling in the 1900s. And a very clever man, Carl Larson, famous for the Larsen Ice Shelf in Antarctica and finding the first fossils in Antarctica, saw that there was wealth to be created by establishing a whaling station in Rickvicken in South Georgia. And he did so, but he was Norwegian. And he obviously thought, well, you know, the men work hard, they need a little bit of sport. So he introduced reindeer from Norway, 10 animals, in fact, so that they could go hunting and shoot a little bit of venison. And those animals bred up, believe it or not to 7,000. Two herds, in fact. And there were two herds separated by glacier, which started devastating the island because it is a major breeding site for seabirds, penguins, seals and so on. And obviously the natural flora and, you know, coastal landscapes were being completely destroyed by the reindeer. Particularly there's this grass called tussock, which forms these big mounds that it's very good for breeding, both for the seals and the birds, but it's also very tasty and edible, and the reindeer eating it and you get soil erosion. So they were going to kill them all in a nice way, they were going to cull them in a humane way, and that's when they found they had 7,000. But before that happened, the Falklands thought, now all the reindeer in the north were irradiated when Chernobyl, the Chernobyl nuclear reactor broke down. And in fact, I looked at the data, it released the equivalent of 400 times Hiroshima in terms of radiation, and that circulated circumpolar. And obviously the most radiation came down in the areas of highest precipitation, which also happens to be where the reindeer are, or caribou, the other name, caribou. So it was felt that the only unradiated genetics or genome in reindeer that existed was actually on South Georgia. So the Falklands went to rescue a herd of 60, actually, they took youngsters because they're easier to handle, 60 reindeer and took them to the Falkland Islands. And. And this costs a quarter million pounds, what's that? Almost. Almost $300,000. Enormous sum of money because they had to have ships, they had training in Alaska and so on, blood testing. I wasn't on the scene then, but they were placed, first of all in a government farm. And they had problems. Some. Some died. Then they placed them in a. On a place called Rapid Point, which, once I saw it, I would call Sawa land. Not very good land. It was a peninsula of 10001500 acres, which could be deer fenced. And when I. I was sent to go and examine them, I could see, having done my research, that to be honest, there were none of the conditions that reindeer required on this peninsula. And they were dying like flies. So There were only 13 left when I went to. When I was sent to go and check them, 13 out of 60. And there was one mature stag, one young stagger, and the rest were heavily pregnant females. And I was sent to rescue them. We had a better place to take them 100 miles south on West Falkland. Falklands are big. They're about the size in the UK of the whole nation of Wales. And so they had tried the year before using motorbikes. But I'd read about Ranger, I understood how flighty they were. They have a really, a well honed escape reflex because of wolves, which is not a fear thing. I saw them do it. They would run 100 meters almost instantly, then put their heads down and graze again. And so chasing them with motorbikes didn't work, of course. This is before my time. And furthermore, I had to laugh because I even had a ship standing offshore to move them. They forgot that reindeer could swim, so that reindeer jumped in the water and the people on motorbikes were helpless. So I went, I camped with them, I had food with me, I befriended them, I habituated them to my presence and I caught them. I caught them in a trap. We made a sort of funnel shaped like a giant lobster trap, in a way. But there were all sorts of funny, in retrospect and interesting complications, not least that I caught them before I meant to. And our trap wasn't finished. And I was keen not to let me go because we nearly lost the whole lot anyway. Um, but the long and the short of it is we succeeded. We transferred them to the soup herb place, a really ancient place on the southern tip of West Falkland where geologists chip away at the rocks because a lot of the Earth's mantle is there, which is hard to find. Very ancient. You could, you can feel how, how ancient the geology, the landscape is there. But it had everything reindeer required. Shelter, lichen, rocky outcrops, water, fresh water, beaches, access to seaweed and shells, you know, because they do eat those sort of things as well to supplement the minerals. And since then they have bred magnificently. So I love my reindeer that comes
- [33:56]
A
through in the book, in your descriptions of their faces and their eyes and the ingenuity that you've talked about in the book and in our conversation of trying to figure out what food offering you would make to them as you tried to gain their trust. And you, through talking to some of the people who live there and work there, you tried sugar beets, which is not part of their normal diet. And you were wondering because they're apparently quite suspicious of foods that aren't familiar. Can you talk about when you made the sugar beet mash for them?
- [34:37]
B
Yes, it was quite a revelation. The Sami reindeer herders in Norway used to be called Lapps. The Sami reindeer herders use fly agaric. It's the classic red mushroom with white spots that you often see in fairy tales with pixies sitting on Them or leprechauns, which is also hallucinogenic, so they use fly agaric. The reindeer love it and they're drawn to it and presumably they get high on it as well, and so do the Sammy reindeer herders, apparently. So now I. I quoted this to my great help. Helper, Sarah. Sarah, and. And she said, but, yeah, you're not going to get fly agaric down here, are you? So what I took instead was, was some hay and some silage, and silage is unusual down there, but somebody had made some or halage. And then she. And. And I took some cattle nuts. Those are, you know, cattle cube or nuts are those little pellets you can give cattle, which they turned out, they did sort of like, but they weren't that interesting. And then she suggested some malted sugar beet pulp. Now, it's not something you get in the Falklands, but they're very keen on their horses and particularly they like to race them once or twice a year. And there was one racehorse owner who had imported these dries, really hard, dry pellets of malted sugar beets. Molassed, I should say, molassed sugar beets. So they're sweet and salty and sugary, and it's the sort of residue from the sugar beet factories. But the amazing thing about you had to soak it for hours and it almost miraculously, like a miracle, expands to three or four times its original volume. So you stick it in a bucket and add water and then you have to be very patient and wait, wait a long time. And it was this, even though they couldn't possibly have ever come across it, that they absolutely died for. They were. Shouldn't say died, they didn't die, quite the opposite. But they were ravenous for this stuff. They were disinterested in the other stuff and I had to give it to the local cattle. But the molasse sugar beet, they fought over it, they tipped over the bucket, they nosed it away, they sort of clunked heads trying to eat it. And I knew that I was onto a winner. And that's how I caught them in the end. I was lacing the trap we were building out to these very tall cattle hurdles, these metal hurdles with molasse sugar bee pellets, but moistened ones, obviously, just to try and draw them in and get them used to it. And it was one morning I got out of my tent and stood up and there they were. They were all sitting down, ruminating, chewing the cud, very content. And now happy with me because they saw me as the candy man, the man who brings them food. And that's how we caught them. Close your eyes. Exhale. Feel your body relax.
- [37:21]
A
And let go of whatever you're carrying today. Well, I'm letting go of the worry
- [37:26]
B
that I wouldn't get my new contacts
- [37:27]
A
in time for this class. I got them delivered free from 1-800-contacts.
- [37:31]
B
Oh, my gosh, they're so fast. And breathe.
- [37:34]
A
Oh, sorry. I almost couldn't breathe when I saw the discount they gave me on my first order. Oh, sorry.
- [37:40]
B
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- [38:29]
A
You've mentioned about things that have to be imported and we spoke briefly before taping about how important fairies and ships are to island life, that they bring over the most fascinating array of things. You describe the blue. The berry blue bucket, and you talk to us about how at times it becomes a floating Noah's Ark. Can you tell listeners about the importance of the things that come by ship?
- [39:01]
B
Yes, it goes back to the tyranny of isolation again. Now, the Falklands is well connected. It has a major airport as well as ship that comes over from Chile. So they're okay, to be quite honest. But I think where it's fascinating is St Helena and Tristan da Cunha. Tristan da Cunha is the most isolated island settlement in the world. And I worked there for a year. It took me 10 days to get there by fishing boat. So they. They have a sort of arrangement, a very good arrangement which with a fishing company called Ovenstone, that the fishing company provides fishing vessels for harvesting crayfish. And they harvest about 400 tons a year. Because Tristan has an archipelago of four islands with only 250 people. I should add it's a very small settlement on one island, but they, they harvest 400 tons of excellent crayfish. By crayfish I mean lobster. So they're half a kilo to a kilo or a kilo and a half, and these are processed and go to the EU into Japan as Japanese sashimi and so on. So the fishing company provides the vessels for crayfishing on three of the islands and the Tristanians fish the other one. But on those vessels they come out empty of crayfish, obviously, but loaded with cargo to supply the settlement. And they can also, under licensing arrangements, carry up to 12 passengers on top of a crew. That's before they have to have all the bits and pieces on board, Dr. Fire Doors and so on, that would be required for a passenger ship. So that is a vital lifeline, really. And that arrangement works very well because the fishing boats also provide a route from Medevacs for people who need emergency care. The fishing boats will take them back to Cape Town, even though it is a week to 10 days. St. Helena is even more fascinating in that respect because up until literally just a few years ago I went there in 2009, we were totally dependent on the really lovely Betty Blue Bucket. That's the nickname. The Royal Mailship St Helena, the RMS, as she was affectionately known now the Royal Mail Ships. It's a very specific title, meaning they carry, obviously, the Royal Mail, but anybody who knows the Cunard liners will know that they're rmss too, but they are not any longer mail ships. So the thing about the RMS St Helena is she was the last true Royal Mail ship in the world and she carried not only all our mail, but everything required to living, really, from the very basic things like nuts and bolts right up to a few luxuries like frozen croissants and maple syrup. Not that often, though, usually more than necessities and. And realistically, of course, the personnel, the people to run the island. Saints, and they're called Saints, The Islanders from St. Helena who are going backwards and forwards. There's been a big diaspora, a big leaving of. Of saints from St. Helena to go and work overseas, and then they obviously want to come back home. And on the more sort of tragic side, the Saints that die overseas because they've emigrated or because they are seeking medical attention, but they're sadly terminal, always want to be repatriated and buried in their home soil. No Crematorium on St Helena, so it would bring back the dead saints, but it was also bring back the newlyweds and the newly born. It's a lovely cocktail of people on board. And the ship was run by saints as well, so the crew were all saints. And so when I was on the ship, I was usually conversing with the Chief Steward and so on about his lambs and his sheep because they, they would be working six months on board the ship and they'd have six months off. So in effect there were two crews. And most saints are also small holders, so they, in other words, they keep a few animals. A lovely, lovely atmosphere. A beautiful ship which was half cargo and half passenger with wonderful food and just a, a great sort of, you know, I think an old World vibe about it based very much on the piano liners. And then the British government built Saintly in an airport. Not an easy task. It's a incredibly rugged island. And so the ship has gone on now to. To actually, to actually. We thought she would be scrapped, but she's now actually the St. Helena still. She's been completely refitted, so she has another 30 years in her and she's working for Formula E, carting Formula E cars and the VIPs around the world, which is rather nice because we thought she, she had reached the end of the road and everybody loved that ship. So we were utterly dependent. A true lifeline on the ship that would go backwards and forwards to Cape Town in South Africa, six day trip each way.
- [43:50]
A
You also talked to us about other forms of transportation that you get used to as part of island life, where one is these somewhat harrowing flights on very small planes and transportation around the islands in your rover that is known to get stuck in the mud. Would you like to talk to us about the practicalities of getting about?
- [44:12]
B
Yes, again, it depends on the island, but the Falklands is the one where, as I say, it's a pretty huge archipelago of islands. I always say it's toffee hammered. If you ever hammered a piece of toffee, it shatters into 100 pieces. You've got two main islands, but they're almost cut in half anyway into four islands, east and West Falkland. But if you look at a map, you'll see it's surrounded by other islands, some of them quite big. And a lot of those other islands are actually complete farms. And some of the islands are not farmed at all, they're too small. So as a vet, the only way to get around is to fly. And the government down there, the Falkland island government thick provide an air service by gas. The Falkland Island Government air service, and they fly small islander airplanes. They're short takeoff and landing and they're Incredibly versatile because the weather down there is pretty vicious. So the pilots are really. I admire them no end. They're incredibly well honed and they can cope with some terrible conditions, wind, fog, rain, poor visibility. And of course, they're landing on grass strips almost exclusively, except for two. Well, one actually really. And grass. Some of them are gravel, but they are difficult and often humpbacked. Sometimes they're flooded and they're often covered in geese or sheep. So before the plane lands, the farmer has to go out with a little safety vehicle, including a fire extinguisher, and shoo any geese or sheep off the Runway so that the plane can land. But it doesn't always work, as I describe in my book, when we had a near accident and nearly sliced up a few geese that were hiding and took off at the last second and very nearly collided with the plane. But I loved it, I must admit. You're often sitting next to the pilot, sometimes just behind. And so also greatly to my advantage. Sarah Bowles, the assistant in the veterinary practice, was married to the chief pilot. And so when we'd fly back from a visit, he'd often just take us down to have a look at an old ruined farmstead or some sheep, or better still, as we cross the sea, we'd dip down and look at whales, blowing water or shoals, or fish. Sometimes lobster. Lobster get what they actually call it, but baby lobsters, they're tiny and they turn the sea red and they migrate down there. You suddenly see this enormous patch of red sea. Quite fascinating. So I enjoyed that no end. But it does mean that sometimes you get stuck because of no fly days. But the pilots would do their very best to penetrate that weather and land and pick you up.
- [46:56]
A
And you also talk about driving about in the Rover and, well, the Rover helped you when you had to shore up the hole in the reindeer pen, but it also at times couldn't manage the roads because of mud. Can you talk about getting yourself about on the islands?
- [47:19]
B
Yes, we're very dependent on the good old Land Rover. It's a very practical vehicle. I have one on St. Helena. They're square and boxy, you know exactly where the corners are. And also they're nice and high off the ground and if they do get bogged, they're extremely good with winches at pulling themselves out. And the thing about the Falkland Islands, well, it goes back a bit in history, this. I can take you back to Darwin and the voyage of the Beagle, the HMS Beagle and Captain Fitzroy. Captain Fitzroy was actually a Very clever man, a terribly sad man, actually, he did commit suicide, but a very clever man indeed. He established our meteorological office, he established weather forecasting for sailors, and he established fisherman's barometers, so that ships were aware of storms approaching, so they could reduce the area of canvas and prevent demasting of the vessel and loss of life. So the voyage of the Beagle took them down to the Falklands, and he, Captain Fitzroy said to the Admiralty, you need to establish Stanley, the capital, on the eastern tip of East Falklands. And the reason, partly because sail, it's. It's in the time, of course, of lack of motorized transport and sailing ships can get caught on a lee shore. So with a prevailing westerly wind and the very long linear harbor at Stanley that goes out to sea eastwards, it was the safest harbor, and a very good harbor it is, too. But more than that, there were extensive peat supplies there, and sure enough, Stanley was established there. And in the old days, apparently, the harbor would fill with brown peaty smoke, just like a. A cauldron of oxtail soup. And that is the why you get bogged all the time in the Falklands peat. You think the ground underneath you is solid. It isn't. It's quite often 7, 8, 9, 10, 15ft of heat and it's waterlogged. So you drive happily onto this piece of terrain while pursuing animals, and before you know it, the Rover's up to its axles in peat. And the falcons are incredibly good at extricating the Land Rovers. They do things like bury the spare tire and put the monkey jack, those really big jacks, on it. Because obviously, if you just jack on Pete, the monkey jack goes down and the roadway doesn't go up. But you. You do that. You dig a hole, you bury the spare tie, you try and jack it up and so on and so forth. So a couple of times I got bogged. And of course, as an outsider, you become a laughingstock as soon as you bog your vehicle and have to seek. Seek help. But usually you're in a very remote location. And while I was assessing the reindeer for moving them, sadly assessing also where our losses were, I was looking for skeletons And I found 24, which was very tragic. And I was GPS logging them, so we knew where the money had gone. Basically, they were starving to death. And I did actually bury the Land Rover in the Pete, and I did actually have hay with me at the time. And I managed, after about six hours of digging and jacking and packing hay under the wheels, to get the wretched thing out. I was really not going to go back and say, or call for help because I'd been bogged, because I would have to buy everybody a drink.
- [50:36]
A
One of the stories that you sort of drop in a sentence that I'd love to know more about is you say sea lions on land are like bad tempered muggers. What happened, Joe?
- [50:50]
B
Yes. So elephant seals, you can get up really close, they're huge. I mean, you know, they will, it will start to move towards you, but they're very slow and very huge and you get some nice photographs. The wildlife in the Falklands is incredible. Ordinary seals, obviously they can bite you, but they're quite mobile. Sea lions are special because sea lions can run on all fours and that's the difference. They're fast, they're aggressive, and if you cut them off from the sea, they, they can attack you. The other thing with the Falklands again, it goes back to tussock grass. Tussock forms these enormous spiky mounds. It's wonderful stuff, very, very nutritious, stabilizes the soil and provides beautiful nesting areas. And the seals hide behind the tussock grass because it's also a shield from the weather. So if you're weeding your way through the maze of tussock, because the tussock will often be 8, 9, 10ft tall, higher than you, you have to be very careful because around the corner can be a sea lion and a sea lion will go through you, not round you, so they're not to be tangled with.
- [51:58]
A
There are so many stories in the book and we've touched on quite a, quite a few of them. One of the themes that comes through is the difficulty of invasive species and what they can do to places that you wouldn't expect, like remote locations. One of the species that comes in is the toothfish, but there's also parasites and tapeworms that you have to deal with. Is there a, a plan to help protect those lands from, and the waters around them from invasive species?
- [52:36]
B
Yeah, it's a very good question, actually. We have two major contributing factors to the breakdown in what we call biosecurity around the world. And this applies to human diseases as well, global warming and the movement of people, animals and animal products, both legal and, and illegal. And all those things, or the combination of those things, mean that potential pathogens or seeds or parasites have the ability to move around the world better and to thrive better because of climate change. And we're seeing this everywhere. I know we're seeing it in Europe. I did some work for an overseas development agency, an ODA, sorry, an NGO for a non governmental organization called Mentor Initiative. In 2017 in Turkey, we were working in Syria during the height of the war in ISIS to treat leishmaniasis. And that's transmitted by a little thing called the sand fly. It is present in the southern Mediterranean in places like southern Spain and southern Italy and southern France. But it's moving north because of global warming. The disease is moving north with it too. And that applies to a lot of diseases. So when you come to a place like St. Helena, it's fascinating. St. Helena is a mini Galapagos. And what I mean by that is it has 30% of all the endemic species in all British territory, including the British Isles. And when I say all British territory, we still have something like 13 or 14 overseas territories. So we have a lot of endemic species, plants, insects, and in the sea, sea slugs, fish and so forth. And you are right, what all those areas are under threat, not least because we now built an airport, which is. Which brings with it immediacy. So people can come from anywhere in the world within a day, basically. They can bring with them the human diseases, but also in the airplane they can bring anopheles, malaria carrying mosquitoes, whatever, along with the fact that the cargo may contain animal products which can also transmit certain diseases, both bacterial and viral. And we had a couple of outbreaks, in fact, of disease on the island, which were. Well, one certainly was due to imported chicken products and was quite serious. So biosecurity was part of my job there as far as the animal side was concerned. Not just to protect the animals that we had there, but also to guard against animal products. Bringing in disease can affect humans. And that's the crossover thing between vets and doctors, if you like, that humans are susceptible obviously to animal diseases. I mean, Covid comes to mind. But there are lots of others that can be in cheese, milk and meat products especially. And it's all to do, obviously with sourcing, proper sterilization and pasteurization, and proper handling. So it's a fascinating area on the plant side because I'm interested in all of it. The St. Helena has a wonderful cloud forest with these extraordinary endemic plants, which Curse Gardens in London is actively involved in. And the trouble with invasive plants, of which we have really very many in St. Helena, is they tend to be hungrier, greedier and more aggressive. And by that I mean they steal the light, they steal the ground on the water by having a more exploitative roots, root systems. And so these endemics which haven't had to compete in that way, are shriveled out, and we only have small islands of endemics left. That's also partially due to the activity of coats. Goats were released in the 1500s and had done extensive damage by the 1700s. So a lot of the soil around the edge of St Helena has gone into the sea, and it's now a denuded volcanic landscape. Very beautiful, actually, because you can see the volcanic landscape, but it used to be forested and obviously the whole ecosystem has been damaged by man as well, cutting down and felling trees. So we've lost quite a few species there already. So now in the modern world, we do our best to protect what's left, not least because things are getting worse, not better. It's not just a question of maintaining the status quo, but as I said, the increased movement of animals, animal products and people, and global warming especially, means the threat is now greatly enhanced, not least because St Helena has now built an airport and we can just bring things in, good and bad.
- [57:02]
A
For listeners, the book opens with a map so you can follow along to which island each story goes to. It contains a number of photographs. Partway through the book, there is a rural Agatha Christie plot with bovine consequences. You can also dig deeper into the story of the floating farmyard. We've touched on just a bit of so many stories, and we're starting to run out of time. I'd like to ask you, what do you hope this episode sparks for listeners?
- [57:38]
B
Sorry, could you repeat that? You just broke up a bit.
- [57:41]
A
What do you hope this episode sparks for listeners?
- [57:45]
B
What I hope above all, I would put it like this, and I think I was commissioned to do a job for the Wall Street Journal just recently, very recently, and I had to assess five books on remoteness. And one of them I took, I mentioned already, was the Voyage of the Beagle by Charles Darwin. It's 500 pages long. And the very last paragraph, the very last paragraph, he sums up exactly how I feel about working overseas and traveling overseas. It expands your horizons, it makes you more tolerant, it makes you more interested in the rest of the world, and it makes you particularly at ease with different colors, creeds, religions, ethnicities, architecture, foods, whatever, And I think that is a healthy thing. If you look at the world where we have trouble, it is usually because of parochialism, in other words, an intolerance of people's differences. And working overseas and traveling gets rid of that. He also said, and I agree with this totally in the last paragraph, but it also teaches you to distrust people. You obviously come across rogues and villains as well. But after that, he says another thing I agree with, and that is the world is full of wonderful, generous people. You just have to go out there and find them. They're there. And I'm really grateful for the fact that I got into the South Atlantic Islands. It starts with the Fulcrums, but it led to three others and I wouldn't have swapped it for anything.
- [59:24]
A
Thank you so much for being here today, Dr. Hollins, and sharing your book, Vet at the End of the Earth Adventures with Animals in the South Atlantic. You've been listening to the academic life. I'm Dr. Christina Gessler, inviting you to please join us again.