The result was a very sick dog, but also Fergus was close to being a dead duck. Peter was luckily able to remove the line and the small lead ball, but the hook had gone down his gullet. His shocked owners rushed Fergus to the Port Douglas Vet where he was operated on to remove the potentially dangerous fishing hook.

“I thought he had chewing gum in his mouth, then I saw fishing line and a sinker poking out of his mouth, so Peter removed that part but then we realised he’d swallowed the hook” said France. Dr Harry from Port Douglas Vet had to operate but thankfully the hook was still in Fergus’s stomach and not in his intestine’s region, so the operation was a success.

More dangers

While the mild-mannered dog is still a little tender in his stomach area, he’s alive and that’s all that matters to Peter and France “We’re angry, some people are just plain irresponsible, I mean we went back the next day to the Sugar Wharf and there were more discarded hooks with bait attached,” said France.

Shockingly people are also smoking and discarding their cigarette butts on this historic wooden structure despite the large signs put up by the Council informing people that it’s a heritage building and not to smoke there. As far as discarded hooks are concerned it’s not only a clear and present danger to animals but small children who might be on the wharf. Peter says he’s annoyed that fishers would be that uncaring to leave their dangerous gear around the wharf and not take it away for proper disposal.

“The vets bill will be close to $4000, and it’s almost cost Fergus his life, all because someone who was fishing off the Sugar Wharf didn’t care about their actions” he said. To make things worse when Peter went back to the wharf to make fishers aware of the incident, he was abused and sworn at by one of them. Not a way to treat anyone let alone a person who’d almost lost his best friend.