A busy day July 10
Had a busy day today. I was called by a guide in park that he had seen the wild dog with the broken leg. We responded immediately and spent 3 hours trying to track them down. Unfortunately it was so cool that they were on the move hunting. I was very impressed with the cooperation of the guides and parks department working as a team to get the jobs accomplished. My goal is to strengthen these binds as the guides are in the park all day everyday with tourists and are in radio communication. I then responded to a call of a sick Baboon at one of the game lodges. The poor guy was obviously an old buck that had been beaten up and kicked out of the troop. We darted him and treated him with antibiotics and pain medication. On the way to the park he decided to start waking up in the backseat, which led to slamming on the brakes and all doors flying open to get out before he grabbed us. I darted him with another dose and the poor guy fell asleep again but not before soiling the back of my land cruiser. We hope he recovers from his bite wounds to his backside and can find a peaceful life in the bush. Never a dull moment.
Wildlife work is so unexpected. Sometimes weeks go by with no occurrences then it’s every day. I responded to a call of 2 warthogs in town that had been injured. Both hogs had a prolapsed uterus and rectum. I could only explain that by them either being hit by a car or injecting plastics causing an intestinal obstruction and straining to defecate. They were both inside a drainage ditch so we had quite a time getting them out to dart them. After successfully sedating them examination revealed severe injury and infection to prolapses in both cases. Unfortunately treatment in these cases is usually unsuccessful and both needed to be euthanized by injection while asleep. It would have taken them a week to die from these injuries. Later this evening Park wardens brought in a Goshawk that had been hit by a car. It was in severe shock and has a broken wing. Unfortunately Goshawk died that evening.
