Viv gone wild

OK, so enough of my whining about yams and freaking brown rice and grains (which, I currently am stuffing my face with. If I close my eyes and think of chicken McNuggets . . .).

I mean, apart from the yams and cattle feed, life has been treating me pretty good. I just got back a while ago from my venture down to Oregon where I volunteered/did a mini-course down at one of the many zoos.

I drove down to Oregon from Abbotsford with one of my classmates. The fan in her car was broken, and seeing as it was nearly 30oC, we drove the whole way down with all the windows open and truck exhaust blasting in our faces.

By the time we pulled into the parking lot of the zoo, we were dehydrated, dusty, sweaty and really ready for a good shower and bed. I was also hungry. And the zoo was closed. There were no signs of life except the pesky peacocks that were busy strutting their stuff on the rooftops and making that peacocky "MWWWWWWWWWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGHHHH!" sound that only peacocks make.
AFter knocking on a bunch of random empty buildings and seriously contemplating jumping the fence, we finally located a guy who was throwing out some trash.

"Um, excuse me, but do you know where we can find the zoo vet?"
The garbage guy closed the lid on the can and looked up at us.
"The vet? why?"
"Um, we're vet students. We're supposed to be here for a workshop that's taking place this week?"
He looked at us in silent contemplation.
"I'm the vet. Come on. I'll show you to the Main Wolf House where you guys will be sleeping."

The Main Wolf House turned out to be the Maned Wolf house.
"You guys ever heard of Maned Wolves?"
"No."
"They're a wolf species native to South America. They've got these long legs and are extremely shy animals. There's two in the house. Try to keep quiet so you guys don't scare them. They're real prone to gastritis when they're stressed out," said the vet.
"There are two in the house?!" I asked, wondering just what the hell I'd gotten myself into.
"Well, they're in an enclosure attached to the house. You'll see."

And I did see. The house was a giant converted barn that was donated to the zoo by one of those crazy "cat ladies" that used the barn to house her hundred or so cats which she "rescued." It consisted of a giant room where there were ten cots and mattresses against the wall for us to sleep on and one bathroom and shower, a laundry room and . . . a pen of maned wolves.

For the next seven days, I would fall asleep at night to the sounds of the wolves scuffling in the pen just one wall away from us. Giant black spiders would emerge once the sun was down and skitter across the floor, chasing beetles or trying to crawl into my shoes. I made a deal with them that I wouldn't smoosh them and they could crawl into my shoes at night so long as they were out by the morning.

In the mornings, I would tip-toe past the wolf enclosure on my way to the sink to brush my teeth and peek inside to find them either sleeping, fighting or staring at me with big mysterious wolf eyes.

Most days, we were expected up be up and ready to start our day at the zoo clinic by 7am. Our days began with briefings by the chief vet of the zoo. There were five vets there, the chief vet and his four interns. The rest of us were vet students from all over the globe: Canada, Portugal, Spain, Germany, Mexico, Poland, Argentina, and of course, America.

Finally, I was to see what a day in the life of a zoo vet is like.

And it was everything I thought it would be and more.

Over the next few days, I got to catheterize a buffalo's vein, play anesthesiologist to a full grown cheetah, vaccinate a couple of cheetah cubs, feed a giraffe, feed a rhino, give apple juice to an orangutan, and play with bongos, lions, bears, elans, elephants and more. It was AWESOME!

Most of the animals were darted with a CO2 gun or a rifle or blow dart. The drugs we use for zoo animal knock downs are about 10,000 times more potent than morphine and come in a super concentrated solution that is so potent that two or three millilitres is all it takes to knock down a full grown buffalo. One drop could kill an adult male human. You have to wear gloves and goggles and be extremely careful when loading up your anesthetic darts . . . or you will die. They told us stories of how many a zoo vet met their end this way.

For all of our large carnivore knock downs, we had the zoo keeper with a loaded shot gun standing with his gun aimed at the animal, even after it was unconcious, on the off chance that it would suddenly wake up and kill one of the surgeons or dentists working on it. They told us many more gory stories about zoo vets losing their lives this way. It was only when we had IV access via a catheter that the zoo keeper would put away his gun.

Over the week, we ended up castrating a bison, vasectomizing an elan, doing a root canal on a brown bear, doing a pre-shipment health check on a couple of cheetahs, vaccinating a few cheetah cubs (they would make the cutest "RRRRRRAAAAAAEEEEEEEEEEEEHHH!" sounds and then hiss, spit and try to bite my arm off), treating a corneal ulcer in a bongo, and doing a health check on a lioness. I loved every minute of it.


me and the little cheetah cub I vaccinated

The week flew by and before I knew it, I was waving goodbye to everyone and hopping onto the plane that would take me back to reality and to the horses and cows and dogs and cats that seemed so tame now.

I arrived back in Calgary on the Sunday night, exhausted (we had some 16 hour days at the zoo) but happy. In a way, I was worried about going to work the next morning and finding it dull. Neutering a cat was going to seem lame after neutering a buffalo.

My first patient of the day came skittering in behind his owner. It was a froofy little toy poodle with a studded collar. I sighed. This was like child's play.

"Just a vaccination appointment Vivian. You can handle it," said the receptionist to me.
I supressed yawn, summoned up some enthusiasm and told the owner to follow me into the exam room.
"So how is 'Fluffy' doing today?"
"Oh he's good. Just needs his shots."
"Great, I'll start out with a physical exam."

I put on my stethescope and reached out to listen to Fluffy's heart.
And that's when the little bugger flipped out and bit me. It took all I had in me not to swear.

"Oh! He's not normally like this! he's the sweetest puppy ever at home. Aren't you Fluffy? Aren't you the sweetest puppy ever!" said the onwer endearingly to her canine spawn of Lucifer.

"OK," I said patiently to the owner, "let's just let him sniff my stethescope first and then we'll try again."

I lifted the stethescope close to his nose. He growled at me and casually sunk his teeth into my hand. I was now officially angry.

I grabbed a muzzle and in the epic battle of my life, managed to slip the little menace's head into the muzzle.

"Oh I'm sorry!" said the owner, "He's just so scared right now!"
I looked at the growling furball on my table and realised I hadn't even tried to take his temperature yet. Getting a needle into him for his vaccine was going to be fun.
Eventually, I had to admit defeat.

"Well, I won't be able to do a good exam on him. But at least we know his teeth are good! heh. heh," I said sarcastically to the owner. "I'll just leave the room and grab the vaccine shall i?"

I went, grabbed the shots and got back into the room, reinforced with a different muzzle and my syringe of vaccine.

We got him vaccinated in the end, but not before Fluffy got a couple more good bites in my hand. To be fair, that was cus I shoved a thermometer up his wahoo and shoved a needle into his backside. I unclipped the muzzle, and in one fluid motion, whipped it off and darted to the other side of the exam room from Fluffy. We eyed each other down from either side of the room, both licking our respective battle wounds and plotting revenge.

The owner broke the tension and thanked me for vaccinating her dog. I let them out of the room.

I closed the door behind me and let out a giant sigh.

The receptionist knocked on the door.
"Vivian? We have another appointment for you. We need you to check the incision on a pitbull."

My heart skipped a beat.

So maybe a summer of dogs and cats wouldn't be so tame afterall.