Tuesday, September 02, 2003
What is "pager duty?" you ask. . .
Well, I had pager duty from 8 p.m. last night to 12 noon today. At 8 last night I went to the wildlife clinic (located in thew small animal clinic on the veterinary school campus) and met another person from my team who passed the pager on to me. I stayed until about 10:15 to hang out with "Puddles." I went home and watched some mindless television while I worked on lyrics to a song I'm writing about "Puddles." A bit after midnight I decided it was time to take a shower and do the weekly scrubs and lab coat laundering-and right before I headed for the bathroom, the pager rattled on the coffee table. I called the number, which connected me to the veterinary ER, and they said they had checking in some orphaned squirrels and a pigeon.
By the time I rode my bike over there, Amy, a second year veteran of the Wildlife Clinic, had put the pigeon in a cage and was working on a baby squirrel. It was very young, and in desperate want for a warm body and a full teat. She tube fed it some electrolytes and I put it in a incubator.
Orphan cases like this are very needy, requiring more attention than the clinic can handle, so they eventually get sent to a local wildlife rehabber. The nice thing about the clinic is that they send the "finder" (the person who brings the animals in) a postcard to tell them how the case ended up. For example, when I first got in, a dead sparrow was lying on the exam table. Amy filled out a card for the "finder" explaining that the bird died. This way finders can get some closure and if an animal does recover and get released, they can see that they have made a significant impact by bringing the animal in.
There was also a set of three squirrel siblings brought in, older than the lone one, and much friskier. Tube-feeding them required a bit of skill I didn't possess. The cute black one kept pulling the tube out with his forepaws and pulling his head back and off the tube.
Just like puppies and kittens, baby squirrels cannot urinate or defecate (poop) on their own. Mom usually licks around their groin area to stimulate excretion. When mom is not present, we can use a damp rag or cotton ball to simulate the licking--then like magic, baby pees and poops for you.
