Hey, did I tell you I made a book? But did I tell you ten times yet?
In celebration of my new collection of the so-called ‘best’ of 30 years of journalism, Clippings, each Monday throughout March I’ll spotlight one of the more than 100 essays in this hefty tome. I hope you’ll consider grabbing a copy, now available on Amazon as a paperback for a mere US$14.99, or as an e-book download for just US$2.99!
It was interesting combing through piles of yellowing clippings and old computer files and trying to figure out what to include in a survey of my so-called career. But this profile from when I worked in Oregon circa 2002-2006 was a definite. As a kid, I always wanted to be a zookeeper, until one day I realised that would involve a lot of blood and animal feces. But getting to shadow an actual wildlife park vet around for a day was pretty darned cool, and one of my favourite job assignments.
The zebra veterinarian
The Roseburg, Oregon News-Review, May 2002
WINSTON, Oregon — The veterinarian is taking a close and careful look at his patient, like any good vet should.
He checks his patient’s pulse rate and takes a blood sample.
But this patient isn’t somebody’s pet beagle or kitten. Lying unconscious in the grass, he’s 700 pounds, nearly 6 feet long and covered in black stripes, and he requires eight full-grown adults to move him from place to place.
Toz is a full-grown Chapman’s zebra, and today, he’s getting a house call from his doctor, veterinarian Modesto McClean.
McClean, 43, has been the senior veterinarian at Winston’s Wildlife Safari since 1999, taking charge of the health of 600 animals — representing 90 different species — who call the park home.
“You’re a specialist at being a generalist,” McClean frequently says about his job.
And with good reason.
In the course of a typical day, McClean’s duties cover the entire animal kingdom. Besides the zebra examination, on this morning he also has an African hedgehog with ringworm to deal with and a wolf recovering from foxtail weeds in its ear. Another day, he tends to a dove with a broken wing and supervises a tricky dental operation on a suffering cheetah, all before noon.
“You’re always shifting gears,” McClean says.
Toz is being moved soon from Winston to a new home, a private reserve near Portland.
Animals come in and out of Wildlife Safari all the time. Some are swapped to zoos or other parks, while others, like Toz, are used for breeding purposes and exchanged around the country. Toz has fathered at least three zebra offspring at Wildlife Safari, but to avoid the genetic breeding pool becoming muddied, he’ll move on and let other, more genetically diverse zebra take on stud duties.
“Spring and summer seem to be our busiest time (for moves),” said Deb Ryan, Wildlife Safari’s assistant curator. “Within the next month we’ll probably move 10 animals out, and probably move five to eight in.”
Toz has to be examined for his health and for a lingering lame leg prior to the move. Bringing the zebra in for an examination isn’t as simple as putting him into a pet carrier. Most wild animals must be sedated before they can be safely examined or treated.
“The toughest part of zoo medicine is the anesthesia,” McClean said.
“Zebras are very aggressive,” Ryan added. A variety of drugs are used as tranquilizers, some of which are highly dangerous if not handled carefully.
“A few drops more and I’m going to kill the animal,” McClean notes as he carefully mixes the solutions together into a dart. It takes a steady hand when dealing with the drugs. They can be administered with a dart pistol, a blowgun or an air gun, depending on the size of the animal and the thickness of their hide.
A zebra has tough skin — “I say zebras are like horses on steroids,” said McClean — so a rifle is used to administer the knockout punch today.
Every animal must be handled differently, McClean says. Originally from Southern California, his career has taken him to treat animals he might never have imagined he would. He’s worked with dolphins and chimpanzees, and even anesthetized a towering giraffe — “probably the hardest anesthesia in all of medicine,” he says.
McClean first came to Wildlife Safari in 1995, where he trained under the previous park veterinarian. He was educated at California Polytechnic State University in San Luis Obispo and Oklahoma State in veterinary medicine, and also served an internship in primate medicine and surgery at Yale University.
He has also consulted in private veterinary practice for several years. McClean came back to Wildlife Safari in 1999 when he became the park’s senior veterinarian.
Because the animals mostly roam free at Wildlife Safari, McClean and park keepers have become experts at what they call “binocular diagnosis,” where they carefully observe the animals to detect any sign of a possible medical problem.
“I don’t have time to go every day to check every animal, so I rely on the keepers too,” McClean says.
Toz the zebra has been moved out of the park’s general population into a small, half-acre enclosure to prepare him for his move. It also makes it easier for him to be drugged, because Wildlife Safari staff won’t have to chase him down.
“Some people think hoof stock aren’t all that smart, but they know what a gun is,” McClean says as he watches Toz nervously gallop away from him.
The doctor raises the rifle, takes careful aim at the retreating zebra, and fires the dart, which brings him to the ground in under five minutes.
Once McClean is sure he’s fully unconscious, the staff gets to work, popping in an intravenous tube dispensing solution, as well as injections of atropine to keep his heart rate up. A monitor is hooked up to his tongue to check his vital functions, and an oxygen tube is placed in his nostrils. McClean checks out the zebra’s leg, which has been treated previously for weak tendons, and finds that his hoof is suffering some obstructions which he removes.
While Toz is out, a pint of blood is also taken from him. The blood will be checked and then frozen, kept in store for possible transfusions.
“This blood someday will save another small zebra,” McClean said.
Any small checkups that can be done on the zebra are also taken care of. One park employee uses a tool belt set of pliers to scrape a buildup of tartar off the zebra’s large teeth, each the size of a man’s thumb.
It takes eight park employees to transport the drugged Toz onto an open trailer for his move across the park. He is lifted onto a rubber mat, as one employee holds his IV and McClean monitors his vital signs. Toz is taken to a holding stall where he will live and be watched closely for a few weeks before his trip to Portland.
The entire procedure, from the dart being fired to Toz waking up in his new quarters, has taken just under an hour.
“I’m going to rate it as for a zebra, an excellent anesthesia,” McClean says.
The rest of this delightful yarn and much more can be found in my new book Clippings: Collected Journalism 1994-2024
Nik Dirga 