Life's a 'small furries and exotics' zoo for Bridget

When Bridget Hayes was growing up in Dublin's Smithfield, her family's 'back garden', as her publican father described it, was the Phoenix Park, where she regularly looked through the fence at Dublin Zoo and said "I want to work there", writes Brian Byrne. She eventually did, and her experience there is part of why she now has her own business outside Kilcullen offering boarding and care services for small and exotic pets.

Though her childhood home was over their Keoghs of North King Street pub, today known as The Cobblestone, there was always contact with animals. "That was the time of the Sunday horse market in Smithfield, outside the front door, and I was always asking my Dad to buy me a horse," she remembers. "He never did, thank God, but he also loved animals and we always had dogs."

She finished school in 1989 and sought out a career in Veterinary Nursing, which was not a mainstream area for study here. "There was a part-time course in Kevin Street, and I spent a year doing that. Then a classmate and I decided we'd go to England instead. I canvassed all the banks looking for a loan to go to study there, and AIB gave me one. That evening I told my parents I was off to England the next Sunday." A course of study at Berkshire College of Agriculture was followed by eight years working in a veterinary clinic in London, which was 'a great experience, and a great social life too'. 

The next phase of her life involved returning to Ireland, working for a period in Nutgrove Veterinary Hospital in Rathfarnham and then MOSS Veterinary in Naas, meeting her husband Keith and coming to live in Carnalway where they are raising their four children. One night, while working the late shift in UCD's Veterinary School, she spotted an advertisement for a Veterinary Nurse in Dublin Zoo. "It just jumped out at me, on the day applications were closing. I don't know how I had missed it earlier." Well, better almost late than never, and Fortune smiled and she got the position in 2012. Apart from fulfilling a childhood dream, it gave her the opportunity to work with a selection of animals that she would never otherwise have encountered. Though it wasn't always glamorous.

"My duties included, for instance cleaning up the poo after the elephants," she remembers with amusement. "And in my first week or so I was asked to check out the macaws. These were parrots with big beaks, and I asked if it was OK to go into their enclosure? I was told, sure, go ahead. When I did they all started making a lot of noise. As it happened, they had all been rescued together some years before from a place in Kilkenny. One, a beautiful red called Billy, had some words, rude words, and I found myself in the middle of a place in Dublin with a bird swearing at me. I was on a high. It was brilliant, and I became passionate about my time there — I absolutely loved it."

Passion notwithstanding, nine years later Bridget felt it was time to move on, and settled back to look at some options during the pandemic. She had been considering setting up her own specialist business, and took the opportunity last year to do a Business course with the Kildare Local Enterprise Board. After that she set up a Portakabin beside her home, roped in family to help get it ready, and opened for business this summer to provide boarding and care for pet 'small furries and exotics' as her specialty is known. These can include rabbits, gerbils, guinea pigs, hamsters, rats, ferrets, birds, and a range of reptiles. It's a limited demand sector — she doesn't do dogs and cats, for which there are ample facilities elsewhere — but there are also limited places that facilitate such pets. "There aren't many places where they know how to feed frozen chicken to a snake once a week," she laughs. "I was kept busy through the summer, and the bookings for Halloween and Christmas are building nicely." Her Dublin Zoo experience is invaluable, during which she also completed a diploma course in Management of Zoo and Aquatic Animals.

With the Hayes children aged between 8-15, there's plenty of help available, and three have already mapped out their own futures which involve working with animals. Bridget also finds working for herself at home has brought about a nicer work-life balance. "I still do some part-time shifts elsewhere as a veterinary nurse, but it's all so much better now not rushing out at half-six in the morning to sit on the N7."

And, even though she has left Dublin Zoo, she has her own small zoo at home to enjoy, with an ever-changing cast of characters. 

Anyone wanting to contact Bridget, phone 085 7055857, message on her Facebook page, or email hayesbridget1@gmail.com.

NOTE: This article was first published in the Kildare Nationalist.

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