A little over three weeks ago, Spring arrived in the quickest of fashions at our hospital. Early in the afternoon one day, we answered our Wildlife Hotline and were met with our first baby squirrel call of 2013. Since then, our calmer winter season has officially ended and our hospital is once again filled with animals and all the hustle and bustle spring brings! Right now, we have many patients at our hospital including fifteen baby squirrels, cottontail rabbits and more! Below are the stories of two of our interesting adult patients.
Early this past week, we received a call about a Virginia Opossum laying in someone's driveway in Hicksville. Animal Care Volunteer, Sheila, quickly responded and brought the opossum to safety at our hospital. When she arrived, we knew immediately she was in rough shape. Blood stained her hair around her face and one eye was swollen shut. The opossum was breathing very heavily and certainly struggling. She was barely able to keep her head up. Upon examination, we could see most of the trauma was to her head but her breathing was very concerning to us as well. As we palpated her abdomen for injuries and swelling, we stumbled upon a pouch full of tiny pink babies. A still undetermined number of babies were inside the mother's pouch, all attached to teats, and they needed their mom to stay alive. While we have very good success raising opossum babies, there is a point when they are so small in size (about the size of a human thumb or less) that we have found them to be impossible to raise. We knew that if we lost the mom, we would lose all of the babies as well. We consulted with our wonderful veterinarian, Dr. Leonhardt, who evaluated our opossum patient for trauma to her ribs and internal organs. Luckily, she had substantial bruising but no fractures to her ribs or damage to her organs. She did have a fracture in the jaw, which she sustained when she was hit by the car.
Over the past week, our opossum has been a wonderful patient and is slowly but surely coming around. For the first day, we had to tube feed her a supplemental diet as her injuries kept her appetite down. By the second day, she was able to eat a high protien very soft diet of baby foods, canned cat food and yogurt. On the third day, the opossum was looking much better. Her breathing had improved markedly and she was able to sit more upright and sleep more comfortably. Mom had babies continue to recover in the quiet and comfort of our isolation room. She is given unlimited food and is only disturbed twice per day for medicating and cleaning of her bedding. We are hopeful that in a few weeks she will be fully recovered and we will be able to release both mom and her babies back to the wild.
Another patient with a unique story came in early in the week as well. We received a call mid-week from a caller by Route 106 in Jericho. The caller had found an injured Canada Goose in the middle of the road. She was blocking cars from hitting the goose and was desperate for help. Rescue Transport and Education Volunteer Jim quickly dispatched from Bayville to the goose. On arrival, he could see that the goose had no ability to stand on its legs. He brought the goose in to our hospital for evaluation. Upon exam, we discovered the goose had no fractures in either leg and appeared to have normal movement in both legs. He was not, however, able to support his three plus kilogram body on those legs. This did not look like a typical spinal injury case and we suspected perhaps there was damage to the pelvis. The goose was brought to Dr. Leonhardt for x-rays on Thursday. We were shocked to learn that the x-rays showed no fractures but instead showed two foreign objects inside the goose's GI tract. Inside our patient was a dime AND a razor!
The metal toxicity was likely due to the dime which is composed of 75% copper and 25% nickel. As long as these items were still inside the goose, it would continue to suffer and deteriorate further. Dr. Leonhardt again got to work on our patient and surgically removed both items! We picked up our patient the next morning. Next, we began the process of finding the treatments that we needed for our patient. Metal chelation treatment is a medication that is given that traps the metal to the chelating agent (Calcium EDTA) and then allows the metal to be filtered out through the kidneys. We finally located the Calcium EDTA at one of the emergency veterinary offices on Long Island. Rescue Transport Volunteer Michelle happily agreed to pick up our much needed medication and drive it from the South Shore vet to our hospital on the North Shore! The medication arrived and we began treatments right away. Treatment for this goose includes supplemental tube feedings, two injections of Calcium EDTA daily and fluid therapy to help flush out the metals. While this goose has a long way to go before he starts feeling better again, we are happy that we found the cause of his problem and that he will get the help he desperately needs!
We will keep you posted on both of these patients as they hopefully progress through their recoveries.
