This weekend I packed my bike up with a few 'pooter-parts and such and
headed South to Dayna's place.  I left her with a better system and reduced
phone bills (no more Compuserve long-distance, she can now telnet there via
a local cheap ISP) and a personal sense of wonder.
 
'Twas a fascinating weekend.  The sheer number of critters was purely
amazing...all well cared for, many were rescues.  I can't begin to impart
how much she cares about these furkids (and others), but an overview of a
few may give you some idea:
 
Mittsie: This 9month old fert is very ill with a combination of Helicobacter
and PBD.  He's been on a hand-fed syrynge diet of Dayna's Duck Soup formula,
"woozle goo" for 3+ months and despite all that and a recent surgery
(stitches all the way up the belly) he's in very good shape and spirits.  He
eagerly accepts his goo, his fur is in superb condition, he's friendly as
hell and he's only slightly underweight.  Best guess (both mine and Dayna's)
is that he'll be fine, long-term, although weening him off the hand-fed
primo diet will be rough.
 
Two new rescues: while I was there (on Sunday) Dayna got a call to pick up
two sick (adrenal) ferts...I'll devote a seperate post on this alone...
 
South American Pigmy Opposum: I've forgotten the dude's name; he was rescued
after being attacked by a male sibling and other than a slightly bent front
foot (completely healed and functional) he's fine.
 
The Frog: Exotic "white lipped" variety; Dayna was called to a petshop after
his new owner screwed up the installation of a heat-lamp and damn near
sunburned him to death.  Much burn-salve later, he's fine, poor guy...
 
The *Shrimp*: Sigh...this is gonna sound silly, but Dayna will do her
damndest for *any* critter, including this poor sick 4inch long tropical
*shrimp*.  I was with her when she drove 10 miles out of her way Saturday to
collect 5 gallons of fresh oceanwater to help keep his tank completely fresh
and help flush his bacterial infection making him swim funny; note that his
"old" water didn't look at all bad.  Wrapping my head around the concept of
a pet shrimp was hard for me, 'cause I've eaten too many...but he was
certainly an interesting shrimp.  Sadly, he was real close to the end of his
four-year typical lifespan, and passed away Monday.  She'll try and fix
*anything* or anyone...
 
One of the things I got to look at was her medical supply room.  I
personally was able to dig through a *large* supply tub filled with odd
items like intubating kits for "premature infants" per the label (used for
emergency airway and feeding for ferts!), ultra-mini sutures and other
pediatric care goods, enough pills of every description to stock a pharmacy,
small-grade hypodermics critical to emergency hydration, pediatric IV rigs,
sterile surgical supplies, sterile gauze literally by the crate, human adult
arm slings (used to sneak a sick fuzzy out of a location seconds ahead of
Animal Control!) and more stuff unheard of outside a hospital.  She
explained that most was supplied by various vet friends, or in exchange for
aidwork and a bit was from hospital "mandatory turnover" of "still-good"
supplies.  Her ferret/exotic medical library is the envy of vets everywhere.
 
In discussing her methods and abilities, she draws the line at personally
performing surgery unless it's of the emergency field "stop the blood loss"
type, which she's (unfortunately) had much experience with and is certainly
equipped for.  For *real* surgery like Mittsie's intestinal or an adrenal or
such, she teams up with one of several vets.  Recently, she's hooked up with
a young, inexperienced vet who's eager to learn; in exchange for training in
disease, infirmary care and fert anesthesia she can arrange zero-cost
surgery, which is exactly what'll happen to the two new adrenal girls.  On
her budget, it's the only choice; if Mittsie is any indication, it works
quite well.
 
Besides the sick critters mentioned, there were 5 very healthy and playful
ferts, several Hedgies including the cutest recently weaned litter, adorable
Sugar Gliders, etc.  One of the ferts was a rescue from an abuse situation,
and showed the timidness around strangers you'd expect of such a case, the
others a playfull boisterous bunch.
 
Dayna's facility, while run on a shoestring, is real and functioning well
and definately helping fuzzies.
 
(Cute postscript to the Shrimp's passing: turns out that it was MRS Shrimp -
she was hoarding a massive load of eggs while sick, and as her dying
geriatric act, laid all 500 to 1,000.  And a tropical fish expert has
confirmed she wasn't virginal, either...Dayna's life is *not* to be lacking
in huge multicolored shrimps, though most of these rare suckers will be sold
and should add a bit to the shelter fund?  Which to me is just plain the
essence of what "Karma" is all about...)
[Posted in FML issue 1783]