Nellie, the truff le hunting hound of Suffolk
WHEN Nellie the English bull terrier kept digging up the back garden, her owners were not best pleased.
But it turned out Nellie wasn’t just enjoying a little wanton destruction – she was busy discovering a gold mine.
Janey Auchincloss, 48, and her husband John Perkins, 53, were astonished to find their dog had unearthed a stash of valuable black autumn truffles.
The couple, who run a B&B in Lavenham, Suffolk, now sell the truffles at local markets or trade them with nearby businesses.
They are worth £1 a gram, and the couple say Nellie has uncovered at least £1,000-worth each season for the past two years.
Her discovery is all the more remarkable as experts claim it is extremely rare to find truffles in that part of the country.
Miss Auchincloss, a mother of two who works as a garden designer, said: ‘We could not believe it when she turned up with a truffle in her mouth.
‘At first we were a bit annoyed that she kept digging up the garden. We could not work out why she was doing it.
‘But we soon realised she was using her powerful nose to seek out truffles – they are the last thing you would expect to find in a Suffolk garden.
‘I had not realised you even get them in England, I thought they are just usually found in France and Italy. At first we thought she would just get one or two, which is rare enough, but then she just kept finding them one after the other.
‘We have to be very careful – she absolutely loves them so we take a bone with us and use it to pry her away from them.’
Miss Auchincloss and Mr Perkins, a former detective chief inspector, bought Stone Farm B&B in 2006. Nellie discovered her first truffle in the autumn of 2007 and continued to find the odd one until last year, when she stumbled across a bumper crop. Her biggest truffle so far weighed 108 grams (4oz), and was the size of a fist.
Mr Perkins said: ‘The truffles are amazing, we really are sitting on a gold mine of the stuff. We have been thinking about putting them on our menu, we might start grating them over the scrambled eggs.’
‘It is funny, most dogs actually cost their owners money but Nellie certainly earns her keep.
‘We are not that bothered about money from the truffles but Nellie can at least afford to pay for her own dog food.’