About us

Our Story

Our story started with a love affair.....as all good stories do!

Easter 2017 and the youngest member of the Nell's Nibbles Team fell in love with a little JRT called (at that time) 'Snowflake'.  

Poor little Snowflake was found wandering in the middle of a cold, snowy night in Ireland by our Uncle.  She was emaciated, had an open wound on her neck that still had rope around it that she had chewed through and was freezing.  He scooped her up, wrapped her in his jacket and she went all the way to Dublin and back with him throughout the night on his deliveries.  When he got back home he fed her and started looking for her owners.  A beautiful little girl of about 6 months old - surely someone, somewhere was missing her?

It seemed not.  She wasn't chipped and after asking around he found where she came from but they had moved on.  Taking the cat and leaving the dog tied up with no food or water under a piece of corrugated iron up against the side of the house.

And so she stayed with him and his many dogs until Miss Biddy met her for the first time.  We came home and a full scale 'please can we have Snowflake?' attack was launched on my poor husband by Miss Biddy (along with all sorts of enticing promises to be good FOREVER.... you get the idea!).

And so, in August 2017, we brought her home with us, renaming her 'Nell' as this was the first chapter of the rest of her life (and just because I liked the name!).  Just two years old she still needed to gain weight and was very nervous of, well everything really.  We were determined to give her a better life than she could possibly have imagined on that freezing snowy night in Ireland.

All was going well until she started to go off her food.  She would run and hide when her dinner was placed down.  Strange as although she was no longer guarding it from her new Big Brother Charlie the Beagle, she was still a bit of a foodie!  Bad went to worse and she ended up at the vets (unashamedly giving a shout out to Vets for Pets in Cirencester where Vet Martina and her team literally saved her life) on a drip and lots of medication feeling very, very poorly.

A diagnosis of Pancreatitis was made.  Most likely from something she ate during her time fending for herself and exacerbated by all the lovely food and treats we were giving her :(

This changed our lives forever.  All the pet shop food was discarded and vet food brought in.  All the stashes of chews, Bonios and other dog biscuits were given away and a steep learning curve of 'try it and see' was undertaken.  We could try her on different ingredients and had the medication to counteract any side effects luckily whilst crossing them off the list.

So now we have a HUGE dehydrator dominating our NEW Nibbles Kitchen seperate to the house and we bake treats on a regular basis.  This has been our journey over the last few years and we know what a difference pure treats have made to both our dogs (Charlie was wheat/grain intolerant so we don't include any of that in our treats either) and wanted to share it with you lovely people.

Thank you for reading and supporting our venture.

Love

Nell and the Team

x


NB:  Sadly Big Brother Charlie left us to cross the Rainbrow Bridge recently - at 16.5 years his body was tired...... Nell is struggling to be an only child and has turned into a real 'Houdini', escaping whenever she is left along - not that she goes far, she just frightens herself silly and hides by the cars in the driveway until someone comes home and finds her!  RIP Charlie Boy - you were the BEST big brother ever and will be sorely missed xxxxx