Lost and hound! Family get dog back after SIX years
ON the day his beloved puppy vanished, apparently taken by thieves, two-year-old Ethan Ferrier was distraught.
Over the next six years, his hopes were raised and dashed again several times as possible sightings of Fern the spaniel turned out to be false.
So when Ethan’s mother Jodie received a call on Wednesday from a vet’s to say they had the dog at their surgery, she didn’t get her hopes up.
Fortunately, however, Fern had been microchipped as a pup and the veterinary nurse was able to confirm her details with Mrs Ferrier.
The astonished family jumped in their car and drove for four hours from their home on the Isle of Wight to the vet’s in Twyford, Berkshire – about 30 miles from where they were living when Fern vanished – for a happy reunion.
Mrs Ferrier, 36, said: ‘I didn’t expect Fern to recognise me after so long. She went to walk past me, but then turned back and started to wag her tail. Her tail has not stopped wagging since.’ She added that Ethan, now eight, ‘has been in shock ever since. But as soon as we got Fern into the car, they curled up together on the back seat and haven’t been apart’.
Fern, a sprocker spaniel – a springer and cocker cross – was one year old when she disappeared from outside the family’s farm in Malden Rushett, Surrey, in 2013.
When an extensive search failed to find her, Mrs Ferrier and her husband Tom, 39, called the police who agreed it seemed she had been stolen.
Ethan was so devastated that as soon as he learned to write he wrote a letter ‘to the men who took Fern’ asking for her safe return. Mrs Ferrier, a personal assistant, said: ‘Ethan would ask over and over again why anyone would want to take her.’ She said the long hunt for the dog, which included Ethan wearing a ‘Find Fern’ T-shirt, had been stressful for the family and they had made at least four trips to see dogs they thought could be Fern only to have their hearts broken.
The family now live in St Helens on the Isle of Wight. Mrs Ferrier was cooking paella for dinner on Wednesday when she took the call from the vet’s at 4.30pm.
Fern had run out in front of a car and the driver took her to the vet to have her microchip scanned. The Ferriers quickly put Ethan and his siblings Abbie, four, and Rowan, six months, in their car and drove 80 miles to Twyford – taking the paella with them to eat on the way.
‘The veterinary nurse was amazing and stayed late so we could collect Fern,’ said Mrs Ferrier. She said Fern had clearly been used for breeding, but had been well fed during her six years away.
A 9ft python that escaped from its owner’s home in Cambridge on Sunday was recaptured last night after being spotted up a nearby tree. The owner said the snake, called Turin, had suffered scratches and a swollen gum.