by Julia Collins

Hapless hound Scooby is on the road to recovery after serving up a scare for owner Paul Cooper.

The lively seven-month-old golden labrador had emergency surgery after accidentally swallowing a dessert spoon.

Owner Paul Cooper, of Margate Road, Ramsgate, said: “I couldn’t believe he’d done it and I still can’t quite. He didn’t muck around with teaspoons, he went straight for the big one!

“He often sits near us when there’s food around and while we were eating bread and butter pudding the previous evening my partner Marie Regan fed him some from her hand.

“She was holding the spoon in her other hand and quick as a flash, Scooby went over thinking there might be food there too and took the spoon straight out of her hand.

The X-ray which revealed Scooby's unusual 'meal'

“When we saw that it wasn’t in his mouth, we realised that he must have swallowed it.

“But he didn’t even flinch, he just carried on as normal.”

Mr Cooper took Scooby to Thanet Animal Hospital in College Road, Margate, the following day.

Head vet Jill Matthews tried to remove the spoon with an endoscope, but when it became obvious that the cutlery was stuck firmly in Scooby’s stomach, she performed emergency surgery to remove it.

She said: “I’ve taken all kinds of foreign objects out of dogs, but in 32 years this is the first time I’ve removed a spoon.

"i’ve taken all kinds of foreign objects out of dogs, but in 32 years this is the first time i’ve removed a spoon" – head vet jill matthews

“It was a bit complicated because when I tried to use the endoscope, I couldn’t get hold of it because the handle end was close to the beginning of the small intestine.

“I had to remove it through the stomach wall, which is major surgery, but he’s a young, fit dog and with painkillers he was able to eat breakfast the day after the operation and was well enough to go home.

"It was such a big spoon but Scooby is quite a large dog even though he’s very young and a dog that size can easily swallow things like this if they go down the right way and labradors are more prone to swallowing things before testing them.

“I hope that he continues to make a good recovery.”

Practice manager Heidi Purdy said: “When his owners brought him in, you would never have known that there was anything wrong, he was jumping around enthusiastically in reception and seemed totally happy.”

Relieved Mr Cooper said: “He has tried to eat smaller things such as the tops of Smarties tubes, but we’ve always been able to get them off him before now.

"He sometimes takes clothes out of the tumble dryer but he’s never tried to chew them.

“I’m so glad he’s on the mend and I’ve been looking forward to getting him home because he is such a lovely character. It has been very quiet without him.”