The Hippo with Toothache (27 page)

Once near the Channel Islands, Baker D's signals showed that he moved only small distances and stayed very close to land. Three weeks after his release, he was barely moving from one day to the next. On day seventy-six after release, the satellite-linked transmitter sent its last transmission. Not a good sign. We began to assume the worst.

At the Center we reviewed the pattern of satellite-location signals. The data seemed to indicate that Baker D had died. The relative lack of movement could mean that he'd been floating lifeless in the water. Thereafter, his body would have sunk to the ocean floor.

We were devastated. The volunteers and staff of The Marine Mammal Center and Long Marine Laboratory, the lifeguards and boat operators—we'd all worked so hard to give Baker D the best care, make the best medical decisions, and create the best possible scenario for his successful release. We wondered what we could have done differently. Maybe we should have tried to find a home for him in an aquarium. Perhaps we should have released him sooner or rehabilitated him longer. Were there other diagnostics we could have performed to find out what was wrong with him?

Two weeks after the last satellite signal, the Center's marine biologist, Denise Greig, and a number of people from Long Marine Laboratory, including the lead husbandry manager, Brett Long, decided it was worth chartering a research flight to have a look for Baker D's body. They hoped to gain some—any—information about what had happened to him. Even if the satellite-linked transmitter had failed, perhaps the VHF radio transmitter was still functional and would lead them to his body if it had washed up onshore.

I wasn't on the plane, but Denise and Brett told me all about it:

It was a stormy February day when the plane set forth on its grim mission. The clouds were heavy with rain, the rough weather buffeting the plane. As the day wore on, the plane flew intersecting search patterns. The crew was quiet, concentrating and listening, intent on picking up even the faintest signal from the radio transmitters in their headphones. Dusk was coming on and the fuel gauges showed the flight could not continue much longer.

Suddenly, the dark clouds parted and beams of golden sunshine shone down on the deep blue sea. Bright rays reflected off the peaks of the waves. A rainbow appeared in the late afternoon sky. The crew heard a faint “beep-beep-beep.” It stopped and started again. Then it got louder and clearer before disappearing again. Illuminated by glowing sunlight, a large group of bottlenose dolphins—250 or more—suddenly sprang into view, moving fast. Right in the center, broadcasting his signal loud and clear every time he cleared the surface of the water, swam Baker D.

Months later, once the genetic analysis was completed (these special tests require a lot of time), we learned that Baker D didn't belong to the group of dolphins near Monterey Bay. He belonged to another well-known group of animals, the group that lives near the Channel Islands. Baker D was never lost. He knew all along where he was and where he belonged.

Martin Haulena graduated from the Ontario Veterinary College at the University of Guelph in 1993. He completed a clinical internship in aquatic animal medicine at Mystic Aquarium in 1996 and a master's degree in pathobiology from the University of Guelph in 1999. He served as the staff veterinarian at The Marine Mammal Center in Sausalito, California, for nine years, and is currently staff veterinarian at the Vancouver Aquarium in British Columbia. Dr. Haulena's special interests are in the medical management of aquatic animals, particularly marine mammals, with emphasis on innovative diagnostic methods such as MRIs, endoscopy, and ultrasonography, developing safe anesthetic protocols, and improving surgical techniques. Veterinary students from around the world study aquatic animal medicine each year under the direction of Dr. Haulena. His professional affiliations include the International Association for Aquatic Animal Medicine, the Wildlife Disease Association, and the American Association of Zoo Veterinarians.

Myriad anatomical and physiological differences exist among the animal groups, creating a special set of hurdles for the zoo vet. Even closely related species with the same condition may show different signs. The best medicine for a mammal may not work for a bird, reptile, amphibian, fish, or insect.

Fortunately, the basic principles of medicine do apply across species—human, domestic, and wild. Many vets who work with wild animals have also practiced on domestic animals at one time in their careers. Veterinary medicine for dogs, cats, horses, cows, and, to some extent, poultry is the basis of our formal education. From these species, we learn to extrapolate. Reptiles, for example, are evolutionarily closest to birds, so there is some crossover to chicken and turkey medicine. The more open-minded and flexible we are, the better we perform as zoo vets.

Kidney failure, for example, leads to a buildup of toxins in the blood that needs to be flushed out. The treatment is a combination of fluid therapy and modifications to the diet, plus antibiotics or other specific medicines, depending on the
cause of the problem. In severe cases, dialysis can be used to keep the patient alive. When faced with a case of kidney failure, the zoo vet will typically review how this problem is diagnosed and treated in other, related species. The next step is to modify and fine-tune it to the animal's needs, with attention to the specifics of its species—physiology, anatomy, and disease susceptibility.

For example, an elephant with kidney failure becomes ill very rapidly. Such a patient requires vast quantities of fluids, over one hundred gallons a day, delivered intravenously and continuously if possible. How are these given? The ear veins work well if the elephant is trained to stand still for an intravenous catheter. Or the fluids can be given rectally with a garden hose, a technique also used for horses. Since acute bacterial infection is often the cause, strong antibiotics must be delivered quickly. Such a treatment plan requires a team of people and swift action.

By comparison, a desert iguana with kidney failure develops clinical signs much more gradually. It may show no signs of overt illness until just before death. Often its problem is not infection but rather a gradual buildup of precipitated protein by-products in the kidney. Because this species is evolved to conserve water, its cardiovascular system can handle only tiny amounts of intravenous fluids. An iguana in need of fluid therapy gets it just ounces at a time, once a day, under the skin. The subcutaneous delivery ensures slow, safe absorption.

Even related animals differ in their expression of the same disease. Most cats, domestic or exotic, develop kidney failure as they age. Some can live for years with this illness without
showing signs, particularly the big cats from African and Asia. When a lion or tiger does become ill, it often responds well to a single treatment with fluids (under anesthesia, of course) and will feel better for months afterward. In contrast, cheetahs develop kidney failure at an earlier age and succumb to it more quickly, usually within a year.

In this final group of stories, zoo vets look to the experts in domestic animal and human medicine to diagnose and treat problems in various animals. Several seek help from talented medical professionals who willingly donate their expertise and time. The patients that benefit include a goldfish, a red kangaroo, a polar bear, a pair of weedy sea dragons, a giraffe calf, and a Nile hippo.

Lucy H. Spelman, DVM

THE CORNERS OF
the stiff cardboard box were mashed and crinkled like so many miniature accordion bellows. When the UPS man slid the container across the cluttered counter, you could hear water sloshing back and forth, and the box rocked gently as its small internal waves pushed to break free.

“Initial on the X,” the man said, handing me a clipboard. “Live fish, huh?”

“Well, I hope so,” I said, scribbling my initials somewhere close to one of the many X's littering the sheet of paper. I handed the clipboard back. Instead of turning to leave, the UPS man looked anxiously at the box and then at me.

“When you gonna open it?”

“Right away,” I said, surprised at his interest. “I'm going to open it right now.”

I reached into my lab coat pocket for a pair of suture-removal scissors. They come in handy for all sorts of things, in addition to removing stitches. Holding them open and using one sharp edge, I sliced the wide piece of transparent tape along one edge of the box. I flipped back the large brown tabs to reveal several sheets of classified ads from the August 1993
Des Moines Register
. At this point, the UPS man leaned over the box as if peering into a volcano. Tossing the newspaper aside, I snatched the double plastic bag from its cardboard hole. When I held the bag above my head so that the fluorescent ceiling light shone through it, we could both see an apple-sized orange-and-white blob swirling in the cool milky water. All that was left in the box was a perspiring, thawed ice pack.

“It's alive. Sure looks alive, anyway,” the UPS man remarked.

“Yes. Yes, it is,” I said with a smile. Then I addressed the fish, eye to unblinking eye. “Nice to meet you, Tulip.”

“Tulip? You mean this fish has a name? Like it's some kinda pet?”

“Of course,” I said to the startled deliveryman. I walked Tulip over to a running aquarium and floated her, bag and all, on the water's surface. This would help her acclimate to her new environment. Once she was safely afloat, I grabbed a blue plastic folder that had been lying next to the aquarium. “See. Here's her medical record.”

“What's she got? What's she here for?”

“Probably has cancer,” I said as I fiddled with the filter and
checked the aquarium's water temperature. “Won't know for sure until we've run some tests.”

“Cancer? Come on, Doc. Fish get cancer?”

“Absolutely. And older goldfish are especially prone to skin and muscle tumors.” Then I pointed to what looked like a stem of cauliflower, dyed red, attached to the side of Tulip. “See this?”

By now the UPS man was standing with me, tank-side. “Yeah. That's cancer?”

“Well, like I said, we need to perform some diagnostic procedures. But it's most likely a tumor.”

“Will she be all right?” he asked, with a degree of compassion that surprised me.

“Hard to tell. She's five years old and has survived two months of treatment with shark cartilage extract. Not to mention nearly twenty-four hours bouncing a thousand miles across the country in your box. Fish are pretty tough, though,” I said. “We'll know a lot more tomorrow.”

“Would it be all right if I check back in some day when I'm delivering? To see how the fish is?”

“Sure,” I said. “She should be right here in this aquarium, unless she's in radiology or ultrasound having images made.” Smiling, I added, “We have open visiting hours for fish patients.”

Once Tulip was safely acclimated to her hospital tank, I picked up the phone to call Iowa. The woman who owned Tulip had tracked me down at North Carolina's veterinary school a few weeks ago, not an easy thing at the time. (This was before Google and the wide use of the Internet.) We'd talked several times about what to do next for this special
fish, and I felt we'd made the right decision. Tulip seemed absolutely fine at the moment, despite her travels and her tumor. Dialing the number, I smiled at the thought of how her owner had found me.

A syndicated column called “News of the Weird” had run a short blurb about my work. Just above a paragraph headlined “Alien Abductees Form Support Group” was a short story about another fish, Zeus, I'd treated for a swim bladder disorder. The story, titled “Veterinarian Performs Surgery on Pet Fish,” must have struck the editors as weird, though I certainly wasn't the only one working on pet fish in 1993. It spawned several morning rock-station interviews—there's a media service that feeds “odd” story fare to the radio networks—and apparently Tulip's owner heard one.

As I'd expected, she was relieved that Tulip had survived her overnight shipping ordeal and was anxious for my opinion of her pet's prognosis.

“It sure looks like a tumor,” I said, trying to sound positive. “I'd like to take some radiographs and make sure it hasn't invaded the spine or any vital organs.”

“You mean X-rays?” Tulip's owner said.

“Yes, exactly. And we might want to do an ultrasound too.” I hesitated. “I would estimate that after these diagnostic tests, and a surgical biopsy of the tumor, your bill could run as high as four hundred dollars—”

“It doesn't matter what the cost is,” she said, cutting me off. “Please do anything possible for her. Spare no expense.”

“All right,” I said. Her reaction didn't surprise me. An owner who commits to veterinary care for a pet fish by sending it UPS to an expert several states away is prepared to
make a significant financial investment. I outlined the plan for the next twenty-four hours and we said our good-byes.