2-pound Wild Boar Grows Up Believing She's a Puppy _ The Dodo Odd Couples

When they first met, Yeju flung her two-pound body right into his mouth. And then she just kept doing it. I've never seen anything like it. We immediately knew that there was something special starting there. Earlier that morning, our gardener showed up to our house with something very tiny in a box. I would never have guessed that it was a wild boar. She was only a couple of hours old and so tiny. She was the size of an iPhone. We searched for her mother everywhere, but it looked like she might have been abandoned. In Sri Lanka, we don't have wildlife rescues here that could take a wild boar. We just couldn't leave her all by herself. We decided to call our vet friend and got to work ourselves. Bubu was at every step of the way to show her the ropes and be there for her. She started eating solids because she saw him do it. He always let her eat first out of his own bowl. And he always watches over her when she's in the pool. He taught her how dogs play with each other. Her bond with Bubu was instantaneous. I think she was missing her mom, so Bubu became her whole world. When she was small, his favorite thing to do was use her as his pillow. But when she got big enough, she was like, nope, now you're the pillow. And I'm just so proud of him because he was always gentle and patient with her, always. It really seemed like he enjoyed his new role of being her dad. Bubu showed Yeju how to become part of the pack. They still continue to follow each other around everywhere. And where there is one, there's the other. It's been a year since she showed up in her box, and Yeju's pretty big now. She's gone from two pounds to 62 pounds. She's become a permanent family member and still lives at home with us, but we also built her her own boar condo outside so that she can enjoy a little bit of freedom as well. Wild boars are viewed as pests in Sri Lanka and can be hunted all year long, so it wouldn't be safe for us to release her back out there. Yeju is older now and she's in her teenage phase, but she still sees Bubu as her dad. She looks up to him and she leans on him for comfort. They're each other's family and will always look out for each other. I'm just so grateful that Bubu was with us throughout this entire journey, helping raise Yeju. I don't know what we would have done without him. I'm just so happy knowing that Yeju will live a long and happy life with her family and her best friend.