WEAMS Day 4

Tuesday I ended up only having a blue-fronted Amazon parrot and not the two parakeets as my parrot was pretty involved.  We ended up taking radiographs of the parrot and then putting it under anesthesia to take a liver biopsy.  It was the first surgery on a bird I've ever seen but I did get to intubate it and that was the first time I've ever intubated a bird.  So I can check that off my bucket list.  Yesterday we went to a place near Peoria, IL to look at a bear.  Unfortunately, the bear laughed at all the drugs we tried giving it via darts or in honey and eggs and we ended up leaving without touching the bear as no one wanted to get killed.  While it was disappointing, it was still kind of neat.  Today we've had a macaw, an African grey parrot, and a ferret and we have a cockatiel and a chinchilla (my patient) coming in still this afternoon.  I have to say the wide variety of animals I'm seeing as well as my lack of knowledge regarding most of these animals makes for a very interesting, and informative rotation!