Zoo

Starbucks Drama

/ Dr. Christine McFadden / Leave a comment

Sometimes it is difficult to find the thread where it all began. Maybe this story started when I first stopped giving out my real name to people taking my order for pizza or coffee or things. People never seem to be able to spell my name. What with the influence on “finding yourself” and being recognized as a unique individual, it seems that all the rules of spelling went out the window and people came up with very creative ways to write their names. I just gave up. The time it took to spell out my name required too much effort for a combination pizza, hold the bell pepper, regular crust, please. So after noticing that a friend was never asked how to spell her name, I adopted it for myself. Across town, if you can order it by phone, chances are my cell number comes up as “Amy”. I assure you, everyone knows how to spell “Amy”. Irritating.

 

So on this morning I had just finished some minor surgery on an alpaca at the Zoo. One of my staff, Courteney, assisted. The alpaca had formed two large abscesses under its jaw, suspicious for a disease caused by the uncommon bacteria Corynebacterium pseudotuberculosis. These fist-sized masses were painful. The alpaca had to be sedated and the abscesses lanced open with a scalpel blade, then surgical drains placed to allow continued drainage while the antibiotics took effect. The operation went smoothly and best of all, neither of us were spit upon. This was excellent, as we still had most of the day before us. To celebrate, I offered to buy her a drink at Starbucks as we returned to the clinic.

 

She placed our order and the man behind the counter asked for a name. “Amy”, I declared without thinking. Courteney shot me a look, eyebrows raised, but the guy behind the counter said “I’ll just make that “Dr Amy”. Startled by all this attention, I mumbled that my real name was Christine but no one could spell it and retreated to a spot near the door where I tried to melt into the wall. Courteney came over to cheerfully inform me that he was a client. Had the dog been there I had a good chance of making the connection but as it wasn’t I stayed glued to my wall.

 

So when the Starbucks man came in today with his two dogs, one an adorable Golden Retriever puppy that looks like an overgrown stuffed toy and his chocolate Lab, I recognized him immediately and was again mildly embarrassed not to have identified him at Starbucks.

And then I remembered That Other Starbucks Drama. Talk about Déjà vu. I’m going to have to write the company a personal apology. Again.

 

Flashback about 4 years. Another Zoo call, this time in winter. For some reason I became completely chilled, my fingers painfully numb from the cold. My assistant that day was Tim. I offered to buy us both a hot chocolate to warm up. We pulled up in front of the Starbucks store, delighted to find parking directly in front. Large glass windows allowed everyone inside to watch us get out of the Jag. Wearing green scrub tops, we looked important, like proper doctors. It was only after placing our order that I realized I had left my purse at the clinic. I turned to Tim for help, but he didn’t have any cash on him. All eyes were upon us. Our drinks were ready. Horrified, I tried to explain the situation but the kind barista waved us off, telling us to take our drinks. This was worse, obviously they’d been scammed before. Red faced, I fled the scene. Once back at work, I immediately sent Tim back with $20. (I’d have gone myself but there was a surgery waiting for me.)

 

Tim returned, now red faced himself. After paying our tab, Tim apologized again while backing towards the door. Unfortunately he backed into a display being used as a room divider, which exploded as he bumped it.  Tim got down on his hands and knees to gather up items as fast as he could, but they asked him to leave. Please. They seemed to feel we’d done enough for one day. Back at work, the staff created a Starbucks “ Most Wanted” poster with Tim’s face on it.

 

So now you know why I pass myself off as “Amy” sometimes and as for personal apologies : I swear I won’t combine Zoo visits with Starbucks again and  oh yeah – I don’t even drink coffee!

 

Christine B. McFadden, DVM

drmc@mcmenagerie.com

The French Fry Challenge

/ Dr. Christine McFadden / Leave a comment

Beware! Traveling veterinarians are everywhere!

Along with the vast hordes of people who undergo summer migration in odd patterns they refer to as “vacations,” we made our way across the North Pole to Europe, specifically France.

You may (or may not) recall that we had entertained an exchange student from that country earlier this year and that she had left us with the declaration (politely) that no where on Earth could the fabulous French Fry be found as it existed in her country, specifically the north of France.

The gauntlet had been thrown. Valiantly I threw all my free air miles into the purchase of plane tickets and we set off on our summer adventure. Our first venture with the French pommes frites (french fry) was …. drum roll, please : at an airport McDonald’s. Oooh la la!

Oddly enough, they tasted like a McDonald’s french fry here. Except they were accompanied by a lime green packet of “pommes-frites-sauce” which was a mysterious white color inside and tasted a bit like sweetened mayonnaise (if you’ve ever had sweetened mayonnaise?).

We passed. It must be an acquired taste, and in all fairness, we had to ask for ketchup everywhere we went, but they did have it.

I suspect when the shoe is on the other foot and the French are visiting us, we may not be so accommodating. We sampled the frites in Paris and across the south of France, then headed north to Lille, almost on the border with Belgium.

Here we met up with our exchange student, whose family welcomed us into their home. We sampled “les frites” in restaurants and roadside stands across Northern France and into Belgium. We ate them with dishes whose names we couldn’t pronounce and sometimes ingredients we couldn’t guess at.

We ate them wrapped in newspaper cones, served in clever tiny wire baskets and scattered across plates. Without exception they were served fresh from the fryer, hot enough to burn the skin off your fingers and tongue, and were indeed crispy/crunchy on the outside and soft and melting on the inside (or was that my tongue giving way?).

With a deep bow of respect, may I say that round one went to northern France in the “Pommes Frites Contestation.”

Wish this could become an annual event! We made the acquaintance of their cat, Plume, and several other pets along the way. We very much enjoyed our trip to another country and found ourselves, delightedly, also happy to come home.

There was much fun with “bonjour” and the French kiss, kiss greeting upon our return and then I got down to work. What a joy! I truly love my work and the people with whom I work.

In my absence, at the Applegate Zoo, our new Black-tailed Mule deer, Lily, had birthed twin fawns! Lily came to our Zoo only weeks before giving birth. She had been taken in by Fish and Game staff after reports of a deer coming up to people in traffic and trying to climb into their cars or mooch something to eat.

Obviously she had been hand-raised (surreptitiously, not legally) then released. Too imprinted on humans to live safely in the wild, Lily found a home here with us, where Donna, the head Zookeeper, watched over her vigilantly and assisted in the twins’ safe delivery on June 15.

Mule deer have a gestation period of about 200 days (compared with a human pregnancy of 280 days). Anxious that the mother and babies bond, Donna kept everyone away initially – not to worry, the little ones are as wild as the proverbial March hares! Right now they have their spots and are slightly smaller than the rooster they share a pen with. Both little does, the fawns will be able to stay with their mother at the Zoo.

Please come visit our City of Merced Applegate Zoo to welcome these newcomers and celebrate summer! A lively Special Celebration is offered this Sunday, July 22 from 10:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the Applegate Zoo. Meet the twins! A bounce house, water games, snow cones, popcorn and more will be offered.

Kids : Wear your swimsuits, shoes and shorts required! The zoo address is 1045 West 25th St. in Merced. Free parking.

Christine McFadden, DVM
drmc@mcmenagerie.com

The Large Animal Vet

/ Dr. Christine McFadden / Leave a comment

 

 

Perhaps the title sounds misleading. A “large animal” vet develops a veterinary practice caring for the needs of livestock such as cattle (dairy or beef), sheep, goats and pigs. A “small animal” veterinarian like me is usually slotted into the care of companion pets such as dogs and cats. So when I examine a 200 pound dog, it is still a small animal and likewise there is often confusion about whom to call when the patient is a pot-belly/miniature pig. Not me.

 

The life of a small animal vet and that of a large animal practitioner are markedly different. One works almost exclusively indoors, dressed neatly, white coat in place. The other weathers life outdoors, facing extremes of blazing heat to icy cold, rain and snow. One always has a sink handy to tidy up. The other uses outdoor hoses more than they’d like. A dairy vet may check over 100 head of cattle in a morning and four “farm calls” make a full day. A small animal vet may follow the medical strands of more than 25 patients a day, winding through exams, blood results, x-rays and working in a surgery or two.  All juggle the demands of unexpected emergency work.

 

Being in an office most of the day, I rarely interact with my brother and sister large animal veterinarians. So when the pygmy goat from the petting zoo fell over dead I was unhappy, but proceeded to perform a post-mortem examination and sent tissue samples off to our regular lab. I had overseen the care of these goats for many years, but they were on the back burner when it came to my interest in the truly exotic Zoo collection. My concerns centered on whether or not the public might have fed something odd to the goat? (I’ll jump ahead here : No. The public did not harm the goat). I mulled over the problem but prepared to wait until the pathology report was finished sometime in the next week. And then another goat died.

 

I was unnerved. The goats were being closely watched and none had shown any outward signs of sickness. They had all lived for more than 8 years at the Zoo and had never, collectively, suffered a single injury amongst themselves. I immediately sought the expertise of a Large Animal veterinarian. The Goat Expert was on a dairy farm. The return call came in as I was finishing one surgery and about to start another. Gloves still on, I was staring at some x-rays

in-between these surgeries when they told me they had Dr. B on the line. Multi-tasking at its best.

 

I hurried over, snapping gloves into the waste receptacle and grabbing pen and paper. I introduced myself and LAUNCHED into a recital of my goat woes. I verified that he had goat experience? Yes. I gave him dates, genders, date of deaths, lack of lab results, still pending. I drew breath to spew forth another list of details and heard him gently respond, “Yes…. I think…. I might be able…. to help”. His measured tones were from a man used to the gentle rhythms of milking machines, contented cows swishing their tails, chewing their cuds. Da-dum da-dum to my staccato dop-dop-dop-dop-dop! I managed to squeeze in a few more hurried sentences (surgery! Waiting!) before he responded calmly, “I think I drive past your practice on my way up from this dairy….”. I opened my mouth. Closed my mouth. I could hear the clouds, feel the sunshine, almost see the shining black and white hides of the gentle Holsteins he surveyed as we spoke. It was all there in the rhythm of his speech. I told myself to stop yapping before he decided my goat problem would be too stressful for him to bother with.

 

An hour later Dr. Thomas Bauman drove up in a large truck outfitted for all manner of veterinary ministrations. He spent an hour and a half doing a post-mortem on one goat. He had a wicked knife and mulled over the cause of sand in the stomach. He felt it was too much. Did we feed on the ground? No. But little kids feed the Zoo goats oat hay pellets and they often dropped to the sand, with all the goats scrambling to get their share. Hmmm. He gave the problem his full attention and we submitted a gazillion samples to the State Lab, including an intact eyeball because it would be useful for trace metal analyses. The final answer was a copper deficiency in the feed, to which Pygmy goats are especially susceptible. Hay grown in the San Joaquin Valley is often deficient in copper. The salt lick fed at the Zoo did not have added copper because Alpacas are in with the goats and they are susceptible to copper toxicity (too much) if supplemented. So we now feed our goats little capsules of copper wire every six months and all is good. But sometimes I find myself wishing that I was a Large Animal veterinarian. Just so I could slow down and smell the …..never mind.

 

Christine B. McFadden, DVM

drmc@mcmenagerie.com