A couple from Memramcook, New Brunswick have gone above and beyond to help their injured golden retriever, Coco, by installing a ‘doggy elevator’ in their home.
After their beloved pet had surgery on her knee, Lise Richard and Jean Gautreau had to quickly come up with a plan for how Coco would get around their two-storey home.
“She was going to be at least 10 weeks no stairs, which is a problem here, so that’s when we decided to find a solution,” Richard said, adding that leaving Coco downstairs without “mom and dad” was simply not an option.
So Gautreau, a carpenter by trade, took to his workshop — prepared not to leave until he came up with a plan.
“I started tinkering and the next thing you know I came up with that box and we tried it and it worked!” he said.
Fabricated out of welded steel for a frame and a carry box made of wood, Gautreau built a custom doggy elevator for Coco.
“The first couple of times we had to sort of coax her and she trusts us quite a bit, so once we said ‘it’s fine, you can go in,’ I put a toy in there and a treat and she started going in,” Richard said.
The box is lowered using a remote control linked to a winch anchored above their stairwell.
“When we go downstairs we just open the latch and away she goes in. She just gets in, lays down or sits and waits for the ride,” Gautreau said.
He says Coco is on the mend and should be able to run the stairs in the next couple of weeks, but the couple will keep the doggy elevator up and running for a while — as it turns out, it’s got more uses than bringing Coco up the stairs.
Richard joked that it’s a great way to bring in the groceries, adding that they “did it a couple of times.”
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