Wildlife Baby!

I love working with wildlife almost as much as I enjoy working with domesticated animals. I think it is the problem of them being both unpredictable and unusual that really gets my interest.

The other week I was in charge of all Avian and Mammal care because of a shortness in staffing. I have only had limited training with the birds so it is a bit of a learning curve in some ways. Most of the birds currently are birds of prey so special precautions must be taken when handling them. Thankfully a few of the birds have been either placed with other facilities or released so not too many remain. One of my favorite birds to deal with are the vultures. They are large and lumbering and cute in a big, featherly, death smelling sort of way. The only thing that deters me in my like for them is that as a defence mechanism they will vomit. Think about how that will smell for a moment....they eat dead, often rotting food, partially digest it then vomit directly at you....great! *gag* I'll forgive them simply because they are amusing.

The woodpecker tried to escape and reflexively I grabbed for him and only got the ends of his tail feathers. It felt like a cartoon for a moment because for all purposes he was flying, just couldn't get anywhere in the process. I just twisted my hand a bit so he faced the cage and back in he flew when I let go with all feathers intact. I call that a success.

For another interesting fact....eye protection MUST be worn when handling Heron. One of the first things they aim for in hopes of being let go it going for the eyes with those beautiful bill of theirs. Yikes.

One of the funniest birds to deal with is a barn owl. He will grab the leather glove with his talons and essentially shrink wrap the glove to my hand them sink that beautiful beak in to it. He will fold on to the glove for upwards of ten minutes AFTER returning him to his cage. He also screams. He has a great fear of humans and IF his wing ever heals he will be a good candidate for release since he has not gotten even slightly used to humans or being handled.

BEAUTIFUL birds


Then they scream

Holy Knees Batman!

Let's start of with my feline friend with CRF. Last night she appeared to be glassy eyed as well as unusually unstable in her hind end as well as was dehydrated but eating decently. To help with the dehydration without the proper tool, I pretty much had to force feed her a kitten sized bottle of pedialyte. As of this morning she was not eating and still dehydrated so away she went back to work with me. Her second set of tests had came back and her creatine levels were in the normal range although she does have an elevated liver enzyme. The enzyme was elevated before the fluids and it was hoped it would also come down after the second test when instead it went quite a bit higher. She will have more testing done in the next two to four weeks to keep and eye on it. Dr. C advized me to not worry about it though we will keep an eye on it because it can be a sign of liver disease on top of her CRF although she believes it is elevated simply because of the CRF at the moment. We gave missy her fluids and she was sent home with a goody bag of needles, ringer solution, and a cord so I can do her sub-q fluids at home. She is to get 300ml per day divided in to two times. After her fluid she was much perkier and proceeded to chow down on some food (GREAT!!!) I can say I honestly do not know how long she is going to be with me and while my senses are saying it will not be for much longer, I can at least have some hope.

Onward to the updates....

The older cat who had problems with the anesthesia passed away Monday night. I feel so bad for his owners; I know what it feels like to lose part of the fur family and it is never easy. The young St. Bernard has surgery and had a baseball sized rock in his stomach...no wonder he wasn't feeling good. He is expected to make a complete 100% recovery!

Today I came in just in time to see a dog on the large side of small being prepped for surgery. I enjoy observing Dr. H. because he takes the time to explain the why and how of procedures to me while he is doing them. The palpated the dogs stifle and showed the abnormal movement of the joint; the femur could be moved backward while the tibia came forward independent of each other. The dog tore his cranial cruciate ligament(anterior cruciate ligament or ACL in humans) but he did not believe it had affected the joint capsule because the sinovial fluid of the joint seemed normal and also that there was probably no damage to the meniscus in the joint which is good news for the dog. He explained he was going to use the Lateral Fabellar Technique(Extracapsular Technique); this surgery uses monofilament nylon(heavy gauge suture that doesn't degrade after being autoclaved) to stabilize the joint.


(Photo owned by www.vetsurgerycentral.com)

The technique is used mostly in cats and smaller dogs (in larger dogs the TPLO of Tibial Plateau Leveling Osteotomy is highly recommended.) Two small holes were drilled on the anterior part of the tibia and the suture was threaded through it then the sutures were laced around the femur and placed around the fabella bone. This leaves two suture from tibia to femur. The ends of a suture go through a small metal bands which are clamped in to place. Dr. H. said only one suture is really needed but because the procedure can fail, he would rather the added stability of the second suture are a backup. You do not really repair the CCL in a dog so much as convince the body it is still there and that is why the heavy gauge sutures are used. The body will build up scar tissue around it and stabilize the joint although the range of motion can be affected.

The surgery was a success. :)

*deep breath*

Have I mentioned I would love nothing more than to be a veterinarian???

Day at the LSV

I arrived at the LSV just in time to find a grey long haired cat crashing with techs and a vet wrapped around him trying to get him to come to. The cat in a geriatric feline who came in for a routine dental cleaning only to react poorly to the anesthesia...he had died three times by the time I arrived to the clinic. He had an interesting time with anesthesia the last time he was under in that it took him unusually long to come out of it. In preparation for that, his dose was much reduced...so this time instead of staying out too long he tried to just die in the process. He managed to pull his catherter out and was coughing up a bit of blood. He had to be shaved (I wasn't there for that) and his owners wanted to know about his beautiful grey hair...no offense but the cat is trying to die...the last thing anyone was worried about was the way he looked. He was put on oxygen and got a couple injections(I cannot recall the types) and another catheter couldn't be put it because his blood pressure was far to low and no one could get in inserted. *grumble*

Not long after a pit bull type dog was prepped for neutering which was a success. Then I observed a female mixed breed get spayed. As I walked out of the OR I saw something big and black on the floor of the clinic and thought "WOW, that is a huge dog...um...calf? There is a calf back here and not in the barn?!?!?" It was a two week old black angus bull calf with a bad case of scours...meds, some IV fluids, and ringer solution later and he was feeling much better! Hopefully he will continue to improve.

A year old male St. Bernard came in and weighed in at only 110lbs, already 10-15 lbs less than the previous weeks he had come in. He was presenting with some rattling sounds in his chest as well as discomfort in his hindend as well as abdomen. He was taken to have a chest x-ray where it was found he has a large foreign body in his stomach and will need a trip to the OR. The owner confessed he had eaten shoes as well as random objects. Silly puppy!

Lunch arrived and unfortunately that is my time to leave because I have classes shortly after.

I grabbed my own cat out of the cat kennel. She was just diagnosed with Chronic Renal Failure on Friday and spent her weekend getting IV fluids. Her levels of creatine and something else are being rechecked to see if they have come down some. She is on 2.5mg Benazepril a day for 28 days and she will be assessed as needed.

Anyway...welcome to my day. lol

Welcome to my blog!

First and foremost welcome to the blog!

To give some information on myself I am a "Pre-Veterinary" student and will soon graduate cum laude or magna cum laude with a Bachelor's of Science in Biology with a Chemistry minor and possibly an Agriculture Minor if I can get the final hours needed for completion. I have wanted to be a veterinarian, and more specifically a large animal veterinarian, since I was just a little girl.

After years of not finding a vet to work with because of insurance problems I have work coming out of my ears! I volunteer at two vet clinics; one Exotic/Small Animal Veterinarian(ESV) and an Animal Care Group which consists of ten vets ranging in specialties from small animals to large(LSV). Besides work with the vet clinics, I am a Wildlife Rehabilitation Intern. To top it all off, I am taking 19 credit hours this semester. When do I have time to breath?