A FULL-SCALE floods evacuation, a poignant dog rescue captured on TV and the successful rearing of a day-old abandoned goat added drama to a hectic year for a North Yorkshire animal charity.

The RSPCA at Landing Lane, York, also reared 147 orphan ducklings and saved a Norfolk Bronze turkey from ending up as Christmas lunch.

And York RPSCA workers investigated 519 animal treatment complaints during the year, and secured 48 convictions.

Some of the animals' stories are chronicled in the charity's annual report for the Millennium year, which saw Channel 4's Pet Rescue focus on the work of Elaine Murdoch, manager of the RSPCA's York animal sanctuary, and her team.

Elaine said the floods were a disaster for the centre, but the amazing spirit of helpers and concerned individuals saved it from becoming a tragedy.

"They say every cloud has a silver lining and this one did," said Elaine in the report.

"Twelve of the dogs who were flood-evacuated didn't return to the home. The lovely people who had taken them had grown so attached to them they kept them."

The Evening Press and Pet Rescue were on hand to record the evacuation forced on the animal home when floods struck in Landing Lane, Clifton.

Elaine later took personal control when a day-old goat workers christened Little Golly was found abandoned on a doorstep, exhausted by crying for his mother.

She said: "Searching for his owners proved fruitless, so I carried him home and thought, to cheer him up, I'd show him my goats.

"Gilly, one of my goats... came straight over and screamed at Little Golly. His eyes lit up, he struggled to get down and screamed back.

"From that moment on they were inseparable.

"She washed him and snuggled up with him and even produced milk for him.

"He's grown up now into a beautiful pigmy goat, but Gilly still believes he's her baby and loves him to bits."

In Spring the centre had so many orphaned ducklings that wildlife officer John Nicholson set up a special paddock for them, kitted out with paddling pools.

All were successfully reared and eventually returned to the wild.

John also reared and released 12 starlings, 11 house martins, eight blackbirds, three bluetits, three hedge sparrows, one greenfinch, one little grebe, five collared doves, 16 pigeons, one seagull, three swifts and a ferret.

"No wonder he was tired!" said Elaine. "At daybreak he said the noise in his house was deafening!"

On a more sombre note, the report pays tribute to Annette Aston, a charity worker who died tragically in September last year.

Annette, of Copmanthorpe, was the partner of Britain's heart tsar and York consultant cardiologist Roger Boyle.

"I lost a very dear friend and so did a lot of animals," said Elaine.

Updated: 11:18 Monday, July 09, 2001