When someone makes the difficult decision to relinquish a much-loved donkey to us for health reasons, they sometimes choose to stay in touch with our grooms to find out how their donkey is getting on.

I have always found spending time with the donkeys to be incredibly therapeutic, and enjoyed my first ‘medicinal’ close encounters with donkeys as a volunteer with The Donkey Sanctuary just a few years back. Last week I popped down to Ivybridge to see some real donkey therapy in action.

It’s Wednesday morning, there’s a chill in the air and frost is still covering the ground. I leave the warmth of my office with camera in hand and venture down to Hurfords where public footpaths and bridleways pass through the Sanctuary’s fields and woodland.

Back in November my colleagues in Northern Ireland helped rescue 10 donkeys and 16 horses from appalling conditions as part of a mass rescue of more than 60 equines in County Antrim. These animals had been shut in squalid conditions without food or water and left knee deep in their own excrement - for some, the rescue effort sadly came too late.

After reading recently the very sad news about Jubilee, the lovely donkey who we all loved and who was part of the "Meet and Greet Team" down at the main sanctuary in Sidmouth, it made us think about a little group of four donkeys here at Axnoller Farm who also do a wonderful job of meeting, greeting and escorting us when we visit them every week.

Zena was born prematurely two years ago, and staff monitoring her condition were concerned to see her curled up in the corner of the stable early one morning, with her mother, Flora, watching over her. Although Zena was breathing, she lay almost motionless in the straw.