Episode 1 Animal SOS

Good afternoon, RSPCA control centre.

What animal is your call regarding today?

In the UK, someone calls the RSPCA every 30 seconds.

Exactly what did you see?

So they're left outside in all weathers

and they've got no bedding or shelter from the rain.

24 hours a day, 365 days a year...

I don't want you to go too close to it

because swans can be very, very dangerous.

..when an animal needs help, the emergency line is open.

Do you know something? I've had non-stop calls for the past hour.

All right, take care, bye-bye. Got a bit of a rough throat now.

It's cos I don't shut up.

Filming as the calls come in...

..and when inspectors respond on the ground...

I'll pass this information through to the officer.

So close.

..rescuing everything from injured wildlife, to neglected pets.

BARKS

-Every shift is a challenge.

-SNARLS

Rhea one, RSPCA nil.

There's no such thing as a typical day as an RSPCA inspector.

Get... Oh, my lord!

We never know what we're going to deal with.

No two days are the same.

-You're keeping a dog out there, it's disgusting.

-Whoa there!

It can get to the point where

you feel like you're banging your head against a brick wall.

It's dirty, sweaty...

It stuns me sometimes, the smells that I come across.

SHE COUGHS Sorry.

There's not a lot of glamour in my role.

Even if you just helped one animal...

Hi, mate.

..it's worth it.

Today, a call to a stag

with a life buoy entangled in its antlers.

I think it's probably getting a bit distressed now.

Inspector Kate Fletcher gets a rather unfriendly welcome...

BARKING

They're going to be fun to get out, aren't they?

..and the cats living in unbelievable squalor.

Oh, my God.

Of all the calls the RSPCA deals with,

there's one animal that will always strike a note of fear.

'I'm not a big fan of spiders at all.'

If it hasn't got four legs and fur, I'm not too keen.

Tarantulas. They terrify me, tarantulas.

My God.

Even thinking about them now, my hands have gone cold.

No, I don't like 'em.

I'll pass that forward to one of our officers,

who'll decide the best course of action.

You know, you phone up one officer and say, "It's a spider,"

and this is the description of it, and you can usually tell by the pause

whether it's something that they're interested in, or they're not.

Luckily, Inspector Tony Woodley

is interested in our eight-legged friends.

I've got a bit of experience with exotic species,

I used to keep spiders many years ago.

He's just the man for today's job.

-Hello.

-Hello!

Collecting a large and very exotic arachnid.

He's rather splendid, isn't he?

This jet-setting huntsman spider landed on UK shores

after a six-week, 10,000-mile journey.

The spider was found by some workers in a warehouse.

I think they're a company who import goods from Taiwan.

And it was found in a box of BMX parts,

inside a large container, and they opened this box,

and there was the spider, which made them all jump.

Is he quite lively?

He is, yeah. He jumps and runs.

'Not all of them are actually going to'

think about the welfare of the animal and what to do with it.

Some of them might put it under their foot.

Whereas some will actually try and help the animal.

Having narrowly avoided a squashing,

Tony's taking the spider to a zoo in Sussex.

One huntsman spider.

I don't mind my spiders, but this one is,

yeah, it is kind of funky, isn't it?

-It just doesn't look nice.

-No.

The legs are long, and that's more what people freak out about,

is the legs.

It could give Tony a nasty bite, so he's understandably cautious

trying to move it into the bigger tank.

-She's the other side now.

-Oh, she's on the other side, right.

It's a far cry from tropical Taiwan,

but this intrepid traveller at last has a new home.

Some of these animals, and particularly a big spider,

even some of my colleagues, I mean,

they're going to run a mile from them, really.

I'll put my hands up and say I'm not a great lover of spiders.

Give me an aggressive, big dog any day.

Yeah, you just try and deal with it as professionally as you can.

But, at the same time, I'm...I'm really scared,

I'll be totally honest with you, I don't like this type of call.

But today, Inspector Keith Hogben has drawn the short straw.

A woman has called to say she's heard noises

coming from inside an imported piece of furniture.

She fears it may be an exotic spider.

Spiders, eurgh! They just give me the creeps. I don't know why.

Unfortunately my nearest colleague was three hours away,

so I'm thinking, "I'm going to have to go to this."

How are you doing? Are you all right? I'm Keith.

Hi. I've got whatever it... It's in the garage.

-Right.

-I bought a jute pod, which is like a pouffe,

and the place it came from, is New Delhi in India.

Oh, right, OK.

And for the last couple of weeks

I've thought I've heard noises in this pod, but...

What type of noises?

Well, almost like something creeping over the polystyrene beans.

HE SHUDDERS OK.

I know I get distressed from seeing a normal house spider.

'So for her to wonder what's in this beanbag,'

I think it was a big relief that we were there.

-It's...

-In there.

-Yeah.

It's quite interesting. It's not...it's not the usual

type of call we have, and I'm a bit wary, obviously.

I'll get it off to the local vet surgery

where I know we can contain whatever it is in a secure room.

-I googled this morning...

-Worst thing you could do, I think!

-It was like, "Whoa!"

-Did it come up with spiders?

It did. There were a lot of spiders. And a lot of tarantulas.

HE SHUDDERS

Oh, no!

But, facing up to his fears,

Keith takes it to the local vet as quickly as he can.

With a net and a Perspex tank at the ready, he's prepared for the worst.

I can laugh about it now, but I was genuinely worried

and I'm really nervous of 'em.

With only minimal protection, the delicate search can begin.

I'm surprised you can't hear my heart pounding, actually.

I'm thinking the spider's going to jump at me and get me.

Haven't seen anything yet.

I'll get ready to run.

Oh, my God, my heart's going.

"What was that? What was that? I'm sweating...

Oh!

THEY LAUGH

..and it turned out to be a bit of plastic or something.

Finally, all the beans have been poured from the bag...

I don't think there's anything in there.

How bizarre.

..but no spider.

The worry is then, I'm thinking, "Oh, my. Is it in my van?

"Or is it still at the property?"

But, there's only so much worrying you can do, isn't there?

'It's not going to be too comforting, I think,

'for when I ring the caller and just say, "We haven't found anything."'

It would have been better to find something than not to find it,

just to put everyone's mind at rest.

'I probably get that type of call twice a year.'

Luckily, this time there was nothing to worry about.

Well, I hope not.

Oh, dear. HE CHUCKLES

While calls to spiders may be thankfully rare,

there's one complaint that inspectors hear all too often.

In London, Kate Fletcher is on her way to a house

where two dogs have been reported abandoned.

'We get a lot of calls about animals abandoned in properties.'

We generally need to prove 48 hours maximum before the dog is...

dog or cat is considered to be suffering.

To do that, Kate has left tape seals across the front door of the house.

Now, four days later, she's returning

to see if the seals remain unbroken.

Those seals have been there for... I think this is the fourth day.

So it's high time we got those dogs out.

BARKING

They're going to be fun to get out, aren't they?

But because RSPCA inspectors have no powers of entry,

Kate immediately calls the police.

I require come police assistance

at an address where we've got some abandoned dogs.

And we're now looking to force entry to get the dogs out.

I don't know whether or not it might be worth trying to get

a dog unit down here as well. They are going quite crazy in there.

BARKING AND GROWLING

We've got to tread carefully, with dogs that are in that state.

A nervous or fear-aggressive dog is in some ways the most dangerous,

cos they're the most unpredictable.

When the police arrive, they find the back doors unlocked.

Hello, it's the police.

The police were quite eager to kind of go in straightaway.

We'll get this little one out first.

Oh, it's open already, is it?

A Staffy cross and Jack Russell are on the other side,

but Kate is cautious.

I just don't know how aggressive she is, that's the only thing.

Doesn't say anything. Yeah, their tails will wag

when they're about to bite you, mate. They will, I promise.

I have to look after my safety,

and I was the only officer present who has experience of handling dogs.

So I've got two dogs who are very upset, and distressed.

Hello. No, she's going to... Yeah, I'm not happy bringing her out.

Kate decides that she's going to need the help

of specialist police dog handlers.

'I felt a lot more comfortable

'waiting for the dog section to arrive.

'They are the people who have got that specialist training,

'and the specialist equipment.'

It's one of those situations where you don't know how it's going to go.

BARKING

As Kate and the handler enter the house,

the dogs run off into other rooms.

'There's a bit of mayhem going on in there, it's quite chaotic.'

The dogs are obviously too terrified to come towards us,

and they're just running away.

With two more dog handlers now on the scene,

the terrified dogs bolt upstairs.

I think if we can get the Staff out, I think

the Jack's getting all her confidence from the Staff. BEEPING

And I think the Jack Russell will be all right when the Staff goes.

BARKING Good girl!

The dogs are clearly more bark than bite,

but they're understandably scared.

The more these dogs are getting chased around, the more wound up

and upset they're getting, and that is really upsetting for me to see.

Good girl!

Right, can you clear a path to get the dog out?

What's this? There's a good lad!

The Staffy cross is removed from the house,

but capturing the Jack Russell proves to be more of a challenge.

There's a good boy!

I was starting to herd him down the stairs,

and he was very interested in the ham that was being offered to him.

Just push him back up, he won't bite you. Just push him back up.

'He just kind of took a running leap.'

A bit embarrassing, really, that we found it so hard to catch him,

and he managed to get away from us quite a few times.

Hey, little man.

SHE SIGHS

Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa! Whoa, whoa!

Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey. Chill. Good boy.

Yep, got him. Good boy.

Both dogs are now safely confined in Kate's van.

BARKING

At the vets, they're examined.

Both are underweight

and certainly pleased to finally get a proper meal.

Someone is hungry. Certainly can eat, can't you?

When we put food down for the dogs, it was gone.

It was gone within seconds.

'Just showing how hungry they must have been.'

I just feel protective over her, really.

Just want to make sure she's all right now.

'Both dogs are doing remarkably well and they've put on quite

'a considerable amount of weight since we first picked them up.'

Really lovely dogs, and hopefully have a happier future ahead of them.

SHE CHUCKLES

There's a reason behind the saying "never work with animals"

and RSPCA inspectors are used to tricky customers.

But sometimes they face a Mission: Impossible.

Every so often, you'll get a rescue,

and you, as soon as you get the job, you realise it's going to be

a bit of a mammoth undertaking from day one.

Inspector Jayne Bashford has arrived

at the vast landfill site in Cannock, Staffordshire.

It's an area full of heavy machinery

but, strangely, it's also home to a herd of red deer.

And its stag has got itself into a very unusual predicament.

There are numerous ponds on the landfill area,

and it appeared that he'd somehow managed to get

one of the rescue buoys attached to his head.

The workers on site were very concerned

because it seemed to be banging his face and causing him

some distress, He was actively trying to get it off.

The landfill totals 80 hectares, so site manager Chris shows Jayne

where the herd had most recently been seen.

I can imagine they would hide away up here in the daytime,

cos they've got a little bit of cover, haven't they?

Absolutely, yeah. Yeah, the... Oh, there they are.

Oh, yes, and there he is!

-See him?

-Yep, got him.

Flippin' 'eck.

The stag's antlers will drop off naturally in a few months.

But Jayne wants to save him from weeks of discomfort.

As soon as I saw how big he was, and how firmly entangled

that life buoy was on his head,

you realise straightaway there's no way

that one person is going to be able to deal with this.

Two days later,

Jayne returns to the site with the RSPCA dart gun specialist, Simon.

If it's a distance shot, I'll probably go for them.

His plan is to tranquilise the stag

so that the buoy can be safely removed.

Deer are notoriously hard to dart.

They take flight obviously at human scent and human sight very quickly.

And Simon needs to be within just 20m of the stag

for the dart to be effective,

which, with such a skittish animal, will be difficult.

While Simon stalks the herd...

All right, they're using this track.

..Jayne acts as a spotter from the higher ground.

-They were against that fence, weren't they?

-They just ran left.

-Simon.

-'He's with them all now,'

-they seem to have corralled themselves against a fence.

-Yep.

Just see whether they gently come this way then,

without being charged, should I?

Right, they're moving back towards you now, Simon, I think. All right?

Cheers, bye.

He's following behind, so we'll lay up and see if he comes this way.

At that point, you have that moment of relief of, he's there,

and the dart gun operator's nearby,

and you just have this vision of an ideal-world situation,

where all of a sudden they're going to be able to

take the shot and get the deer down.

As the herd move towards him, Simon crawls into a shooting position.

But just as he gets within range...

..the deer sense his presence, and the chance is gone.

So I've crept forward and they've taken flight very quickly.

Despite the noise of the traffic, they can hear us coming.

With the deer spooked, Jayne and Simon are forced to regroup.

It's been a long and frustrating day.

They will have known we were there

a long time before we actually sighted them.

Their instinct is to just run.

Unfortunately, that's exactly what they did.

A week later, and Jayne's come up with a new plan.

Reinforcements have arrived.

A team of three RSPCA dart gun specialists have been drafted in

in an attempt to even the odds in their pursuit of the stag.

There was a buzz of anticipation that this was going to be

the day that it would be sorted out.

The three dartsmen set off

to take up different positions around the site...

..while Jayne tracks the deer from higher ground.

My intention is just to walk towards them

to push them back down towards the shrubs.

Suddenly the herd and the stag

are walking straight towards Lee and Simon.

And the stag's within range.

But the deer move just too quickly for them to take a shot.

Yeah, they never stand still for more than about a second,

and it's not long enough for a dart to travel.

Our stag's an escapologist.

The next six hours are a frustrating game of cat and mouse.

They've gone up and over the brow of the hill.

Once again, the team are forced to admit defeat.

Absolutely gutted.

When they just seem to be running away from you at speed, then,

yeah, your heart just drops to your boots,

and you think, "We're just here to help you."

It's day four of Operation Stag

and the team are back for one last-ditch attempt.

This time, marksman Lee is doing everything he can

to blend in with the environment.

Anything that gives me the edge over this red deer is fine by me.

Not good for your skin, you know.

I was very impressed, the levels of determination

and attention to detail.

I've got rangefinder, dart, radio's on silent.

-Do I look silly? Or is that a silly question?

-Do you look silly?

-I'm offski.

-See you in a bit.

Silly or not, Jayne knows this could be their best chance

to get close to the stag.

Lee begins his search through the undergrowth.

And, after half an hour, he gets lucky.

'I've only gone and found him.'

Blimey, well done.

But, as always,

the deer appear to be one step ahead of their camouflaged stalker.

The deer, ironically, seemed intent on going up onto the high ground,

where, even dressed as he was,

he was still going to stand out like a sore thumb.

It's as if they knew.

After four days and over 70 man-hours,

the attempt to free the stag from the buoy has come to nothing.

Nature will take its course,

and, into the spring, the antlers should hopefully shed naturally.

It's a huge disappointment for Jayne.

But there's nothing more she can do.

We tried. We really did try.

Every year, an RSPCA inspector will knock on hundreds of doors.

BARKING

They're trained to investigate complaints of cruelty.

But one thing that can't be taught is intuition.

A lot of this job I think relies on that instinct and our gut feeling.

Gut feelings are really what keep you going in this job,

and it's a motivation to not give up until you're satisfied.

Hm!

Nine times out of ten, your gut feeling's right.

In Wigan, Inspector Vicki McDonald is on her way to her latest job.

There's no reply, so Vicki tries next door.

I'm just wondering if I can have a look into next door's garden

through yours. Is that all right?

-Are you all right with dogs?

-I should be. I hope so.

Vicki can now see the shed where the cats are supposedly being kept.

'It was difficult to see

'because there was lots of ivy hanging around it, but you kind of,'

you just get a feeling that it just didn't feel right.

SHE CHIRRUPS

It doesn't look fantastic in there, I have to say.

I could see what appeared to be kind of piles of poo,

piled up at the back end.

'You could smell something coming out of there that was

'suggesting that it wasn't clean.'

SHE CHIRRUPS

'What struck me as being unusual was they weren't making any noise.'

Now, to just be absolutely quiet, to not be coming out of the shed...

We do need to get in there really to look at that.

Something wasn't right. It just didn't sit well with me.

Thank you for your time. Cheers.

Vicki's told the owner may be home soon

and she decides to wait.

Whatever is going on in there, it's not great,

and I think it needs dealing with today, so I'll sit tight.

'Gut feeling, I think it's something that you just'

get with experience.

You know when you've done the job for a few years,

you see something and you just think, "It just doesn't feel right."

And I may be proven wrong,

but I don't like what I see out the back there.

Two hours later, and there's still no sign of the owner.

Vicki wants to see the cats before it gets dark,

so she decides to call the police.

She can now find out if her hunch is right.

There we go.

'I followed them into the back yard and we were'

just met by a situation that I hoped wouldn't be as bad as it was.

But it was absolutely horrendous.

Oh, my God.

Gut feeling wasn't wrong.

'You could instantly see and smell the most horrendous conditions'

that I think I've ever seen cats kept in.

That is absolutely disgusting.

-Cats are there, see them?

-Oh, yeah.

'The cats were within a shed.'

Hey, pussycats.

'I opened the shed door, and I could see that there were certainly

'sort of five or six cats just staring back at me.'

Three, four, five that I can see. You poor little things.

The structures that the cats were sat on, they had this thick coating

on the top which I can only describe as a mixture of hair, faeces, dirt,

so, whatever had gone on in there had gone on for a long time.

It takes a long time to get that bad.

Cats are lively, curious creatures. They're not meant to be caged

and certainly not in these conditions.

It's actually worse than I thought it could be.

I've never...

I mean...

They may have started the day in squalor

but Vicki is determined the cats won't end it that way.

You've then got to switch to, "OK, we need to deal with this,

'"and let's just get these animals out of here."'

Vicki calls a vet to come and look at the cats.

As she waits, she gathers evidence

in case the owner is later prosecuted.

You could just photograph forever cos it's just everywhere.

Eurgh. Eurgh! It's dripping on me. Eurgh! This is one of them days

when you get in and you take your clothes off at the door

and put 'em in the washing machine. It's one of them ones.

The vet arrives and agrees with Vicki

that the cats can't live in these conditions, and must be removed.

Watch your head. Oh, they're going to be scared.

All right.

One by one, all six cats are boxed up -

a truly dirty half dozen.

CAT MEOWS

It was tricky, it was smelly, it was dirty.

Done. Lovely.

I need to just breathe for a minute.

You've got to have a strong stomach in this job,

'without a shadow of a doubt.'

But we got them all out.

The cats are taken to the local vets.

Here, the full extent of their suffering is laid bare.

They were just... They were filthy.

Their feet were all matted and filthy, their pads were sore,

and they were just clogged up with all the matter they'd been living in.

See how even her claws are caked.

Thankfully, all the conditions can be treated.

There you go, stinky bum.

So the cats can finally be settled in a comfortable bed.

They're clean, breathing fresh air, so that's an amazing improvement

from what we had just a few hours ago for them.

And at last, Vicki can clock off.

We turned up to that address

some ten-and-a-half, going on 11 hours ago now.

There's no such thing as a nine-to-five in this job.

When you drop on something, you drop on it

and you need to get it dealt with there and then.

It's been a long day, but for Vicki, it's all been worthwhile.

What I learnt from that job is,

yeah, absolutely trust your gut instinct.

'I'm glad I stayed, I'm glad I stuck it out for the hours that I did,'

because those cats will never spend another day

living in those conditions.

Next for me is one long shower...

and it might actually be two showers, I think.

I don't care how many showers I need, it's worth it.