The Hippo with Toothache

by Lucy H Spelman

  With the key piece of equipment repaired, we reviewed the schedule for the next day: first Yaloda’s exam, then two more. We’d start early in the morning, setting up and checking all our equipment, including several plastic crates’ worth of veterinary supplies I’d brought from the US. Once everything was ready, each panda would be anesthetized with a combination of drugs injected via a plastic dart.

  I also made a point of running through the techniques we’d be using for the endoscopy. Every time we do this procedure together, the Chinese veterinarians gain confidence in their knowledge; one day, they will perform it themselves. When it was safe to handle the panda, we’d move it from its night-house to a room with an operating table. We’d insert a tube into its windpipe to protect its airways and place a catheter in one of its arm veins to give it some fluids while under anesthesia. The exam would include an oral exam, abdominal palpation, a blood sample, and endoscopy. This last procedure would be performed with our special, now-repaired fiberscope. We’d introduce the endoscope inside the stomach (gastroscopy) and into the colon of the animal (colonoscopy). Each exam would take two and a half to three hours at least, maybe longer for Yaloda, since we knew she was the panda with the most severe problem.

  The night before Yaloda’s exam, our excellent hosts took us out to a restaurant, where we ate many colorful, delicious dishes. I felt completely at ease with my Chinese colleagues. Though most of China’s traditions are very different from Mexico’s, some things are the same. For one thing, Sichuan food is spicy, just like Mexican food. And as at home, friendship and trust are established here over a social meal—socializing that usually includes drinking the traditional Chinese liquor, unless you’re doing giant panda anesthesia the next morning! (We had tea, instead.) Chinese baijou is very strong, not unlike Mexican tequila. We all looked forward to a proper banquet at the end of our three-day stint.

  The next morning, I awoke to the sound of Chengdu’s incessantly honking cars, a brutal alarm system, and took a taxi to the Panda Base. Before we anesthetize our patients, we like to look at them first. So I found the head veterinarian and we went together to see Yaloda. She was in her night-house, sitting on a wooden platform surrounded by stalks of bamboo and piles of loose leaves. It didn’t appear as if she’d eaten anything overnight. The room temperature was comfortably cool in spite of the heat outside; still, Yaloda seemed uncomfortable. I could see that her feces were soft.

  The panda was thin, her abdomen appeared slightly bloated, and her coat looked dull and coarse. Though only eight years old, she looked older. I’d been told that her feces had been abnormally soft for several years now, and that she had not responded to conventional therapy. In China, “conventional” therapy can vary from traditional Chinese medicine to powerful antibiotics. Although I didn’t know why she had not responded to previous treatment, I felt confident that if we could make a definitive diagnosis, we could propose a different treatment and possibly cure her.

  Our team had agreed we’d need to perform a colonoscopy on Yaloda as well as gastroscopy. We didn’t know for certain which part of her intestinal tract was affected. We’d take small pieces of her stomach and large intestine to be evaluated under the microscope. We hoped this procedure would explain why she’d been sick for such a long time.

  Yaloda is a gentle animal, and she was calm before her procedure. When one of the Panda Base vets darted her with the anesthetic drug, she jumped slightly, but then sat back down and watched all of us with her mild dark eyes. I had the impression that she knew that we wanted to help her. I’m sure she found it strange to have so many people paying her all this attention. She fell asleep slowly, having experienced a smooth induction, and continued to do well under anesthesia.

  Although I still worried that the scope might break in the middle of the procedure, I felt we had no option—we had to try.

  With Yaloda sleeping deeply on her side, we placed a mouth gag between her canines to avoid the possibility of her jaws crushing our scope. I passed the scope in slowly, first into the back of her throat, then down into her esophagus and into the stomach. With the camera and TV monitor running, we could all evaluate the images. Nothing in her stomach looked abnormal. We decided not to take any biopsies there but to move on to the colon. I pulled the scope out of her mouth and went around to the other end. So far, we’d found no explanation for her illness. The puzzle was still unsolved.

  As soon as we had a clear view of the inside of Yaloda’s large intestine, we could see that the lining, or mucosa, looked unhealthy, even angry. It was irregular and dotted with red where it should have been smooth pink. We had our answer. We took multiple tiny samples of the mucosa—a procedure used routinely in human medicine—and checked them under the microscope. As expected, we found severe inflammation in the cells of the intestinal lining consistent with inflammation of the colon. Based on these findings, we proposed treatment with a specific medication combining anti-inflammatory and antibiotic drugs.

  Yaloda would likely need this treatment for life. Since pandas have a life expectancy of twenty-five to thirty years, this would mean another twenty years or so of treatment. I was concerned about how she’d tolerate the medication. Giant pandas can be picky about foods with medicine in them, and digestive side effects are always possible. We offered Yaloda the medicine in a piece of apple; to my surprise and relief, she had no problem with it. Indeed, she has turned out to be a great patient, taking all her meds since day one. Almost immediately, her intestinal problems started to improve, and soon the consistency of her stool turned normal.

  On my next visit to Chengdu, I went to see Yaloda first. She had gained weight, and her coat was thick and lustrous. She seemed a happier panda, more energetic and active. She appeared comfortable this time, even playful. Then, for the first time in many years, Yaloda presented a breeding cycle. Because she’d been so ill, her estrus cycle had been abnormal and the staff at the breeding center had felt she was not a good candidate for pregnancy. Now that she’s healthy, Yaloda has been artificially inseminated, a process similar to that performed in humans. We hope Yaloda will become a mom in the near future.

  Personally, I couldn’t be happier. I had the opportunity to help restore a gentle creature to health, and maybe contribute to the conservation of this rare species if Yaloda is able to have babies. Giant pandas are on loan to zoos around the world, where they receive excellent veterinary care, but there is something very special about working on them in their own land. I look forward to future trips to Chengdu to visit all my friends there—including, of course, Yaloda.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Carlos R. Sanchez received his veterinary degree from the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) in Mexico City. He worked as a veterinarian for Mexico’s national zoo, Chapultepec Zoo, from 1992 to 1997. A full scholarship from the British government took him to the Royal Veterinary College in London, where he earned a master’s degree in wild-animal health. On his return to Mexico, he worked briefly for the Zoological Society of Mexico and then moved to the United States in 2000 as the first Latin American veterinarian to be accepted in a zoological medicine residency. Dr. Sanchez finished his residency at the Smithsonian National Zoo in 2003 and continued there as a member of the veterinary staff. His current interests include clinical research in anesthesia and the training of Latin American veterinarians, activities that have introduced him to new places and nurtured new friendships. He has published in several veterinary journals and is the co-chair of the International Committee of the American Association of Zoo Veterinarians.

  When Whale Sharks Fly

  by Howard Krum, MS, VMD, MA

  SOMEONE YELLED, “THE shark is STUCK!”

  I blurted out, “What the hell do you mean, the shark is stuck?” Though I was well aware that good veterinarians were expected to be calm, cool, and collected—virtual pillars of medical confidence—my nerves were shot.

  The big guy next to me gestured down at one of the high-pressure air
casters levitating the 25,000-pound fiberglass box filled with shark and water. “We’re stuck,” he repeated. The device was jammed on a microscopic crack in the brand-new concrete floor.

  I groaned. “Holy crap—you’ve got to be kidding me.”

  We were only a few feet, twenty-seven to be exact, from our final destination. We’d just traveled eight thousand miles with two enormous animals code-named “Ralph” and “Norton” and now were stalled directly in front of our goal. The behemoths were to be the crown jewels for the grand opening of the Georgia Aquarium’s brand-new, 6.2-million-gallon Open Ocean exhibit: the world’s largest fish tank. The new exhibit was scheduled to open later that year, in November 2005. But at this moment, these two sharks, each well over one thousand pounds, thrashed impatiently in their custom transport containers. The sooner we could release them into the big tank, the better. Just then, Norton regurgitated massively, critically fouling his water—again.

  This day had begun over fifty-four hours earlier. Feeling weak, I thought: I don’t handle crises well, or novel challenges, or getting up early in the morning. Why did I take this job? I am a “big-boned” junk-food connoisseur with the physical vigor of a three-toed sloth, and this marathon mission had required a game plan of outrageous, nail-biting, even death-defying logistics. Why had I signed on for the record-setting transport of two huge whale sharks halfway around the world?

  —

  Three days earlier, I’d been in Taipei, meeting with the National Fisheries Council. The entire project was on the brink of collapse.

  “No, we won’t sign it!” said the minister of Taiwanese Fisheries as he slammed his notebook shut, stood up, and began pulling on his jacket. The “it” to which he was referring was a certificate stating, among other things, that the animals would be transported safely and humanely, in accordance with international guidelines. The situation was more than a little ironic, considering that the aquarium had purchased these two animals from a Taiwanese fisherman and they had originally been en route to an Asian dinner table. But without this document, everything would come to a screeching halt: over two years of planning and two hundred million dollars in aquarium construction would be in vain. Moreover, these animals were intended as a surprise gift to the city of Atlanta from Bernie Marcus, our benefactor and the cofounder of The Home Depot.

  Our Mandarin-speaking interpreter, Eunice, relayed the rant as the minister and other officials stomped away from the fifty-foot-wide conference table. “Your country insults the Taiwanese government and Taiwan itself! Other countries would not have this requirement.”

  I grabbed Eunice’s hand. “Wait, wait!” I realized that they hadn’t understood our request. “Please, sir, this certificate merely states that you believe we are going to transport the animals safely. Your government is certifying our efforts, not the other way around.”

  The fisheries minister paused as the translation sank in. He slowly took off his jacket and returned to the table; so did the twenty-three others.

  Dr. Chen, the council’s Taipei veterinary representative, spoke next. “Dr. Krum has worked with aquatic animals for years and has brought with him all the supplies the animals could require—medications including IV fluids, medical testing equipment like a blood gas analyzer, an ultrasound unit, and even a water-quality laboratory. He and his team are equipped to deliver better medical care than even humans could receive in flight.”

  Ten minutes later, they agreed to sign.

  On my way out, I shook Dr. Chen’s hand gratefully. He said, “I really enjoyed your bluefin tuna presentation at the zoo vets conference in Pittsburgh.” Wow, I thought, what a stroke of pure luck.

  From there on out the plan was straightforward: Examine the animals via mask and snorkel to make sure they were fit for flight. On the day of the transport, weather permitting, motor an hour out on two modified ships (one for each animal) to our two-hundred-foot-diameter, fifty-foot-deep sea pen moored off the coast. Then invite the fifteen- and seventeen-foot-long sharks to swim into their stretchers (they’d been trained to do so). Gently crane them on board into temporary, water-filled transport boxes, and head back to the harbor. Lift the animals in custom-made “wet stretchers” (cradling the shark in thousands of gallons of water) and install them in their individual, custom-built ICU transport aquariums with integrated, battery-powered life support. Truck them, us, and approximately five thousand pounds of support gear to the Hualien Airport and load everything onto a heavy-lift prop plane for the short hop to Taipei, where a UPS 747 cargo plane would be waiting. Transfer the animals and take off for Anchorage, where we’d clear customs, get a fresh flight crew, fuel up, and head on to Atlanta. Upon arrival in Atlanta, deplane the boxes onto individual roller-bed tractor-trailers and truck the animals to the aquarium. Offload the enormous boxes onto high-pressure air casters for a short hovercraft ride to the Open Ocean hoist way. Then, with the eight thousand miles and twenty-seven feet behind us, hoist the beasts in their water-filled stretchers up four stories and release them into their spacious new home.

  We’d spent months planning every detail of this move. How many other things could go wrong? Compulsively, I’d already run the calculation in my mind: 1,462. None of this—not one single step—had ever been attempted before. And did I mention that the whole plan was to be carried out while flying under the radar of the world press?

  As it turned out, the novel challenges had just begun. On the sleepless night before the transport, a sizable earthquake threw me out of bed and onto the floor. This was followed by a thirty-knot gale that miraculously gave way to a sparkling sunrise at sea. Then our sharks inexplicably forgot their training of the past two months. Using buckets of shrimp, we had conditioned them to swim into their stretchers, which they hadn’t seemed to mind—until today. Instead, we had to improvise and coax them along with a very big net. Minutes later, Ralph nearly capsized his forty-ton transport vessel when its captain miscalculated the physics of craning the world’s largest fish species on board.

  Norton’s lift went more smoothly. The crane operator on the second, forty-five-foot Chinese fishing boat scooped the leviathan from the ocean without incident, gently depositing him into the seawater-filled twenty-by-six-foot box on the deck. With Norton came a dazzling, life-filled slice of the western Pacific: half a dozen surprised, skin-hugging remora, a tiny school of shimmering jacks, and a rich assortment of colorful seaweeds. It was my first opportunity to see this massive fish up close. His skin tones ranged from a deep, warm slate gray to vibrant aquamarine, dotted with brilliant white spots. I was mesmerized. This was the opportunity we were hoping to offer millions of viewers very soon.

  Few people on earth have ever seen a living, breathing, krill-gulping whale shark. The world’s largest shark is also the world’s largest fish: this gentle, filter-feeding giant can grow to fifty feet in length. Some sharks do eat people, but not this kind. It works the other way around. The flesh of this fish is known as tofu sha, an Asian delicacy. And after cruising the world’s oceans for sixty million years, this species is vulnerable to extinction thanks to just a few decades of overfishing. The motivation behind our mission—to put Ralph and Norton on public display in the world’s largest aquarium—was to inspire millions to care about whale sharks and engender support for their protection.

  As our vessel chugged along at five knots, puffing black diesel smoke, we began plowing into subtle ocean swells. Norton started to ram his previously unblemished, three-foot-wide snout into the white fiberglass wall. Contact with any surface is something these animals probably never encountered in the wild. Norton stiffened, appearing stunned by each successive jolt. I envisioned the deepening trauma as thousands of cells were crushed and exploded. If this abuse kept up, it would lead to open ulcerations that could easily become infected. I had no idea how to manage an open wound on the head of an eternally swimming half-ton shark.

  A tiny fisherman, clad in fish-slime–encrusted boxers and a yellowing T-shirt, jumped to my
aid. We reached for Norton’s snout, trying to hold his mass off the wall. It was futile, of course, but in the process, I noticed that the shark was able to withdraw easily from our touch. I experimented by dipping one hand in the water about a foot from Norton’s right eye; he was somehow able to recoil despite the continued roll of the ship. Next, I tried just a finger: he maintained his distance. Within minutes, and with just two fingers, we had Norton hovering safely off the container walls. It appeared that this sensitive, gentle hulk just needed a frame of reference. With our success, the fisherman grinned broadly at me and I returned a relieved thumbs-up, the only Mandarin I knew.

  As we approached the pier, I saw to my dismay that it was crawling with reporters. Our cover had been blown. Luckily, our captain didn’t appreciate the swarm of uninvited guests either. After a brief skirmish that ended with a cameraman swimming for shore, we loaded the animals into their flight containers on flatbed tractor-trailers and made our way to the airport. Here we ran into another snag, a tense standoff with a machine-gun-laden militia who insisted we wait on the tarmac in the scorching sun for government clearance we already had.

  The plane’s loadmaster, Jose, gave me more bad news. “Doc, these army jerks told me that we have to load and secure the contents of each of the three trucks separately. One at a time on the runway—load, exit, then bring on the next truck.”

  Knowing that Jose had previously worked as a bodyguard for a warlord in Uganda, I asked, “Do you think you can persuade them to change their minds?”

  Jose bullied his way back through the guards and guns to what must have been the officer in charge. After a lot of arm-waving and angry Spanish, he strode back to me.

  “I told him, look, if you want to be the reason these animals die on this runway in front of the world media”—he pointed to the cameras only two hundred yards away—“be my guest!” Grinning, Jose slapped me on the back. “Doc, we can load everything now.”