This cute baby camel has been named ‘Forrest Hump’ after being fitted with leg braces like the main character in the movie starring Tom Hanks so he could finally walk around his enclosure.
Forrest the camel was born with deformed legs and struggled to stand, never mind walk around his enclosure at the Thuele Animal and Leisure Park in Friesoythe is a town in the district of Cloppenburg, in Lower Saxony, Germany.
Martin Pille from the zoo said it had been a serious problem, adding: “Forrest could hardly stand up and walk.”
But help was at hand when one of his carers, Bjorn Tangemann, noted there was a similar problem sometimes with young horses which could be cured with a leg brace, and they decided to try the same thing on the camel.
When it was three weeks old, Forrest was taken to the Tierklinik Luesche, an animal clinic in Vechta, in Lower Saxony where the operation to fit it with a special brace was carried out.
The clinic in Luesche specialises in horses and confirmed that the baby camel had been born with a massive deformity in his front legs. The carpal joints were bending backwards, making it difficult for Forrest to stand up and walk around. After carrying out X-rays, it was decided there was no damage tot the structure of the bones so the leg braces would help fix the camels front legs.
In order to carry out the work, the leg brace for a horse was adapted so that it could fit the camel, and it seems to have done the trick.
For the last two weeks, Forrest has been wearing the braces and is getting better every day, and is now even able to walk around his enclosure with his mum.
Pille said: “He will wear them for another six weeks and then we will be able to remove them.”
A spokesperson for the clinic said: “We hope that the camel’s natural growth in the next six to eight weeks will help the bone structure as well as the ligaments into a healthy position with the help of the prosthesis. We hope the camel will be able to move normally as he gets older.”
In the film starring Tom Hanks, Forrest Gump is fitted with leg braces to correct a curved spine, and they fall off when he is running away from some bullies.
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Story By: Kathryn Quinn, Sub-Editor: Joseph Golder, Agency: Central European News
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