The Tale of Carnita and her babies Apollo, Keko and Aspen

Carnita belonged to a neighbor of Justine’s and was hit by a car in Dec/Jan and Justine rushed her to the vet, to learn she had suffered a broken pelvis.  That didn’t seem to matter to the family and they thought she was just fine continuing life like before living in the garage, eating table scraps with no family interaction.

Just recently Justine noticed Carnita was very pregnant and concerned she could not survive a normal delivery.  Through much begging and diplomatic pleading, Justine was able to convince the owners to relinquish Carnita to JCAPL.

Drs Camacha and Bagley at Clayton Animal Hospital saw Carnita and examined her to make sure her pelvis could support delivery if she went into labor, but hoped she would hold off another week, given her malnourished state and dangerously low calcium levels.  Of course, she started labor slowly after the hospital closed for the day.

We rushed her to Eastern Carolina Vet just before midnight and Dr Barth performed a C-Section delivering 3 pups (of the 5 she carried) and she had to resuscitate them.  Poor Carnita was beyond exhausted for the first 24 hours after deliver and Justine has learned how to be a full fledged nurse-mate to pups and to be Carnita’s Florence Nightingale!   The veterinarians evaluations combined, concluded that Carnita was likely in labor for days, but because of the severely low calcium levels, she was not able to push and deliver the pups.

Were it not for Justine’s tenacious determination to save Carnita, it is with great certainty momma and pups would be deceased if left unattended any longer.

Like Carnita, we are grateful for Justine and all our fosters, who together make an amazing team and make great things happen

!