Fire Island veterinarian boat brings care to pets in need

Theodore Johnson is literally living the dog days of summer.

With a blue flag that spells out "Vet Boat" flying atop his boat, the veterinarian — who goes by Dr. Teddy — motors through the Great South Bay to come to the rescue of pet owners vacationing in the 17 communities of Fire Island. He’ll meet them in their summer homes or rentals so that they don’t have to ferry their ill or injured pets back to the mainland for treatment.

"He could have been wearing a cape," says Andrea Robbins, 57, of Manhattan, whose dog, Riley, needed a vet while the Robbins family was renting a house for a week in Fair Harbor this summer. "It was like a movie. He comes down with his doctor bag; he looks like he just came off the beach. He saved us so much energy, so much angst."

‘EASIER, KINDER’

Johnson, 53, has retrofitted his 30-foot Grady-White boat to include a humidity-free storage area for medicines and a refrigerator for medications that have to be kept cold. He leaves from his summer house in the Fire Island community of Point O’Woods or from Bay Shore, depending on where he is that day. He charges a $125 transportation fee for the boat trip and $200 for a basic exam; medication is extra. Most visits come to between $450 and $500, he says. Pet owners could be reimbursed for a percentage of his services if they carry pet insurance, he says.

Johnson launched his floating veterinary clinic half-way through last summer. So far this season, he’s had more than 40 appointments in 10 communities, he says. Pet owners say it saves them figuring out a pet hospital, clinic or private veterinary practice on the mainland, boarding a scheduled ferry for the half-hour ride, hiring a car service or driving to a vet, and then traveling back to Fire Island.

It also allows a pet to be seen in its home environment rather than suffering the anxiety of a visit to an unfamiliar clinic. "It’s stressful enough that they don’t feel well and have to be examined," says Joanne Ferraro, of Savannah, Ga., a Fair Harbor homeowner whose dog, Ollie, received house calls this summer. "To do it in their own home makes it so much easier, less stressful and kinder."

NO CHANCE TO BE SCARED

Robbins contacted Johnson immediately after her dog, Riley, a mutt, was bitten by another dog under the neck and on the top of the head. "I called his phone; I sent him a picture of my dog’s cut. He said, ‘I can’t do that, he needs anesthesia,’" Robbins said. He recommended an emergency vet in West Islip.

"He was so helpful and it was such a traumatic thing," Robbins says. She was thrilled that Johnson was able to come and take the dog’s stitches and drain out so she didn’t have to return to the emergency vet for that three days later. "Besides the time that it saved me, my dog gets stressed out at the vet. Riley didn’t have a chance to be scared," Robbins says.

Johnson grew up in Cold Spring Harbor, attended Dartmouth College in New Hampshire, trained at the Ross University School of Veterinary Medicine in St. Kitts, and completed a clinical rotation year at Cornell University School of Veterinarian Medicine in Ithica. He owned the former Banfield Pet Hospital in Huntington Station for seven years.

OLLIE’S TOES

One recent morning, Johnson left his house in the Fire Island community of Point O’Woods to do a follow-up visit with Ollie, Ferraro’s 12-year-old beige cockapoo, wearing his royal blue Vet Boat T-shirt. Johnson anchored his boat just off Fair Harbor and carried his medical kit through the remaining water to get to land.

"I saw him last week for licking between his toes," Johnson says, which indicated a probable infection. "Humidity makes bacteria overgrow on their skin." He had prescribed anti-lick, anti-itch medication along with an antibiotic and a daily soaking regimen.

Sometimes, Johnson’s volunteer assistant, Vicki Ungar, who ran an animal hospital in New York City for decades and who summers in Fair Harbor, meets Johnson to help hold a nervous pet during treatment. She holds Ollie while Johnson examines Ollie’s toes. "He doesn’t have any of that pinkness between his toes anymore. It’s all gone," Johnson says.

Ferraro asks him to show her exactly how to do the soaking to make sure she’s been completing it correctly, and Johnson obliges, dunking Ollie’s left paw into a bowl of the medicated liquid.

Ferraro says the Vet Boat saved her from having to leave the barrier island while her sister and children were visiting. "He got here faster than if I waited for the ferry," she says. "It’s just a great service."