Paccombe Farm

I was lucky enough to enjoy the beautiful setting of Paccombe Farm this April, one of eight farms owned by The Donkey Sanctuary in Devon, and home to over 380 rescued donkeys and mules. The farm lies in the hamlet of Harcombe, surrounded by stunning woodland that shelters the donkeys perfectly.

Roger has been at the Sanctuary since 2006 when his owners kindly retired him from beach work. He is such a character and likes to be involved with everything we do.

Some of you may have read one of our previous blogs about a donkey called Spider. For those of you that haven’t, the story started in 1979 when a four month old foal called Spider came into the life of the late Dr Elisabeth Svendsen.

She wrote about him in a book called In Defence of Donkeys and this is how Spider's tale began:

Some of you may have seen the previous blogs on our little cat ‘Posh’. She lives on one of the yards with our elderly and laminitic donkeys. The yard in Spring Boxes is like a little sun trap and catches the sun for most of the morning (when we get any!) which is perfect for our elderly residents as it warms up their joints and they love to bask in the sunshine.

Hello everyone,

I have recently started a new job as a relief groom as a short secondment away from Town Barton.

As a relief I am required to provide cover wherever needed, so it has given me a fantastic opportunity to travel around the other farms and departments to see how they work, as well as meeting all the teams.

Meet Murphy, he came to live with us in 1995 and soon fell in love with a lady donkey named Faye. Wherever Fay went Murphy would follow. He would even stand and watch her eat. He loved her that much. Faye was like a two headed donkey; Murphy stood so close to her you could hardly fit your hand in to put the head collar on either of them.