A bulldog has given birth to a bright green puppy.
Owners Trevor and Audra Mosher, from Canada, were delighted when their pooch Freya gave birth to a litter of eight puppies. But the couple couldn't believe their eyes when they noticed that one female pup was bright green in colour.
The pair feared the worst, but the little one has been thriving ever since.
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The green tint is all down to a process which occurs in the womb, when light-coloured puppies come into contact with a green pigment found in bile, known as biliverdin.
The couple explained that unlike her brothers and sisters, the green pup was born in a black sac, as opposed to transparent.
Trevor told Global News: “We started to dry her off and noticed she was green and immediately again thought there was something wrong. So we googled it, ‘my puppy is green, what’s wrong,’ and apparently it is very rare and it has happened a few times all over the world."
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Trevor says he feels lucky to have witnessed the rare occurrence, with Dr Bronwyn Crane, a veterinary reproduction specialist from the Atlantic Veterinary College at the University of Prince Edward Island in Canada, explaining the probability of having a green pup is less than one in 10,000.
Trevor said: “I’m kind of amazed, really. As rare as it seems to be, I feel very lucky to have witnessed it and be a part of it. I know you hear stories about things like that but to be there and witness it, it was good."
The couple are now trying to come up with a name for the pooch, with social media friends suggesting Fiona from Shrek as well as Wasabi, Hulkette or Pistachio.
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It's expected that the puppy's fur will fade to its normal colour as she grows older. What a cutie!
Lucy Devine