What happens when a male highland calf is raised by a loving family surrounded by their canine pets after being abandoned by his mother and herd. Simple: he thinks he’s a dog.
And so four-month-old James loves licking his owners and the (other) dogs in their home on a farm in North Carolina, USA.
James’s foster parents, Emily and Adam Hopson, found him in the woods and described him as a large baby. They think he was brain-damaged at birth from being oxygen-deprived and suffered from the “dummy calf syndrome.”
They tried to help him and his mother with the nursing process, but nothing worked out. This prompted them to raise James as one of their own and care for him. He pulled through his health complications thanks to their determination.
Emily Hopson thinks James is absolutely lovely. “He is the sweetest creature,” she said. “He loves to lick us and the dogs. And to just lay beside us and be scratched and petted.”
The Hopsons have found orphaned calves as companions for James, who gets along well with them.
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