REALLY LOVE THOSE TIGER TEETH!

This beautiful Sumatran tiger had suffered three fractured canine teeth. This calls for root canal work of the highest order – not something taken on by every National Health dentist in the High Street. Especially for a patient who wouldn’t respond to the instruction ‘Open wide, please…’

Wayne was able to complete some amazing work repairing the tiger’s fangs, meeting with the same success as he previously has with zoo animals as diverse and exotic as meerkats, Tasmanian devils, African wild dogs and even a gorilla! Naturally, dentistry is an oblique diversion from the real story of restoring two iconic cars, but these disciplines have something in common – skills and patience of the very highest order. Wayne has those qualities a-plenty and they first emerged when, as a youngster, he took on building scale aircraft as a hobby. I can lay testament to the challenges as I did the same, although not to the degree that young Wayne achieved: he made flying replicas of First and Second World War aircraft, including magnificent Spitfires (with RollsRoyce engines, of course!) and an Australian designed and built aircraft, the Boomerang, with an eight-foot wingspan that now holds a pride of place in the Victorian Museum.

This hobby continued into later life. As Wayne says, ‘It provided relief from the pressures of my veterinary work,’ and I can imagine there is plenty of that when working on wild animals that could easily take great chunks out of you, if you got it wrong. For Wayne, it’s the same as restoring cars with a unique pedigree; it gives some respite from the rigour of his work.