A romantic farmer has popped the question to his animal lover girlfriend with the help of two DONKEYS.
Four-legged pals Bertie and Derek played the lead role as Nick Cavill asked girlfriend of two-and-a-half years Becca Thomas to marry him.
The pair, who were adopted by Nick from The Donkey Sanctuary, in Sidmouth, Devon, greeted Becca with a note which read “Will you marry me?”
They also made the perfect engagement present.
Nick, 25, who lives with Becca, 34, on their farm near Wells, Somerset, said: ”We’ve always been into buying each other strange presents. She bought me a cow in the past.
”She’s a vet and she’s always loved donkeys. Every time we see an advert about them on TV she goes weak at the knees.
”She had been badgering me to get married for ages, and I wanted her to have an engagement present she could look at every day.”
Nick adopted the donkeys from the sanctuary in November and kept them hidden from Becca on his farm for a month before enlisting them to play a key part in the proposal.
”We got to the bottom of the drive of the farm and I said ‘I have a surprise for you’,” Nick said. ”I told her to cover her eyes and led her into the yard.
”I got Derek and put his face looking at her, so she opened her eyes and got a surprise and started crying.
“I had one note on Derek’s collar explaining the donkeys’ history, and there was another on Bertie’s collar with the four magic words.”
Nick got down on one knee in the stable with the donkeys beside him and proposed.
The couple, who met while carrying out a caesarean on a cow, travelled to Bath that afternoon to choose a ring.
Nick said it had been tough to keep the donkeys secret for a month.
He said: “I had to do a bit of ducking and diving. Derek is quite loud and sometimes. I’d be on the phone to Becca and he’d blare something out.”
Bertie and Derek will now share the farm with four horses, three dogs, one cat and 200 cows.
