Hitch-hiker dassie rescued from engine
A dassie that hitched a ride by climbing into a car engine was rescued when the motorist stopped to fill up the tank.
|||Durban - A dassie that hitched a ride by climbing into the engine of a car was rescued when the motorist stopped to fill up at a Pinetown petrol station. But not before it gave its rescuers the slip.
When the car stopped, its engine switched off and with no air circulating around the adult male dassie, it was driven out by the heat build-up under the bonnet, Monkey Helpline spokesman, Steve Smit, said on Tuesday.
The feisty dassie skipped to a second vehicle as staff and onlookers in the garage went into a frenzy trying to catch it.
While they peered under the second car bonnet, the dassie dashed off unnoticed and hid in a third car parked nearby.
Andreas Mathios, of South African Community Action Network, was notified and he called on Smit.
“Once we had managed, with some difficulty, to extract the dassie from the engine compartment of a Fiat, and noticing the severity of its injuries, we rushed the dassie to our vet, Dr Kerry Easson, at Riverside Vet in Durban North,” Smit said.
In all likelihood the dassie had been chased out of its colony, said Smit, by more dominant dassies, and sustained injuries in the process.
Once his treatment at the vet was completed, the dassie was taken to the Monkey Helpline facility in Westville to be cared for.
He will be released at a suitable spot where he can join another colony.
zainul.dawood@inl.co.za
Daily News
* Use IOL’s Facebook and Twitter pages to comment on our stories. See links below.