It’s hard to believe that in 1984 Adelaide Zoo’s very first female zoo keeper was employed.

I started working at Adelaide Zoo way back in December 1991 as a casual zoo keeper and by this time it appeared that women were well and truly ensconced into the zoo culture and work ethic.

Earlier this week the bird keepers found that one of our plum-headed parrot chicks had a severe fracture up the right side of the upper beak. The bird was rushed up to the health centre as front part of the beak was at risk of being ripped completely off if it happened to get hooked on something.

Hi Everyone

Apologies for the lack of entries in recent times. It's been a busy time for all of us recently.

Wayne, our Head Vet, is over in China at the moment with Senior Panda Keeper, Simone, and Assistant Curator, Jason, to become better acquainted with Wang Wang and Funi. They will all fly back together at the end of November. See Simone's Panda Blog for more details of their trip to China.

Meanwhile, our head vet nurse Dianne is busy ensuring everything is organised for their post-arrival quarantine, which will be overseen by AQIS.

Other things going on for the health centre recently include Ian accompanying a giraffe to Australia Zoo, health checking bettongs on the Eyre Peninsula, Lynley taking some time off to work on her Masters in Conservation Medicine, and disease investigation in bentwing bats at Naracoorte Caves.

Will give a bit more information on some of these in subsequent posts.

Dave

The zoo collection is going along OK at the moment. A Veiled Chameleon in quarantine at the moment in settling in and feeding well. A Woma Python in the reptile house had a prolapsed of its cloaca which thankfully was resolved fairly easily; these can be difficult to deal with in some instances, and he looks to be recovering well with treatment. One of the Fallow Deer in the Children's Zoo injured its knee over the weekend, and at one stage we were contemplating surgery. But, thankfully, she looks to be improving with medication and limiting the area she has to run around in.

Speaking of the kids zoo, we have had three goat kids born in the last week which are very cute! All checked out well when we looked at them, and both mums are doing their jobs splendidly.

Next time I am on blog duty we will have pandas in quarantine. The excitement is building!

David McLelland

Whew.... another busy day. Only have time for a quick chat, so will just write about the patient of the day.... a very cute 4 year old female meerkat, who about a week ago poked her front paw into another meerkat enclosure and had it bitten.

She was brought to the animal health centre after the incident and was anaesthetised to check the damage. Her wound was cleaned, sutured and bandaged and a 7 day course of antibiotics were prescribed. It was decided to house her in the Animal Health Centre so we could check her bandage daily and ensure she takes her antibiotics in mealworms, meatballs or a mouse. It was decided to bring her partner up to stay with her for company.

Hello everybody.

It seems like every time it is my turn to chat I have just been away. Today is my first day back from holidays, lapping up the sunshine in beautiful northern NSW, and attending the best music festival (well, in my opinion!), Splendour in the Grass. I could spend the whole blog chatting about my holidays, but that's not what you are interested in!

 Today has been a very busy day; we are short staffed today so I am both the hospital and clinical nurse, which has kept me on my toes. After conducting rounds with Lynley, the vet on duty, I started feeding, cleaning and treating all animals in hospital and isolation. Then it was time to move into the surgery and assist Lynley with our scheduled procedures. First on our list was our geriatric male Bilby who needed an anaesthetic to re-check his right eye. A week ago his keepers noticed he was not opening his right eye properly and so they brought him up for a health check. On closer inspection it was noticed that he had a corneal ulcer. Lucky for him, his keepers were able to put drops into his right eye and the ulcer has resolved nicely.

Today the vet Dr Lynley Johnson and myself performed a post mortem on a Barbary Sheep.

For these procedures, the vet is required to take certain samples which get stored in formalin and then sent to the pathology lab for testing. All animals that pass away at the zoo get autopsied as this helps us monitor for any emerging infectious diseases, and to establish a cause of death. Results are usually back from the lab within a week.

It can be quite sad having to open up an animal that has died, but the benefits of lab testing are many and this is why we do it.

Mishelle

Hi everyone, Dave here. My turn again this week.

Thought I'd begin this week by telling you about a recent trip up to Venus Bay on the Eyre Peninsula to assist staff from the Department of Environment and Heritage (DEH) to investigate an apparent decline in the population of brush-tailed bettongs (or 'woylies') in a fenced reserve there. This species once ranged across southern Australia from Perth to the Gold Coast. It was decimated by cats and foxes.

At Adelaide Zoo today, car pooled with one of the nurses as motorbike chain is loose and needs replacing.

My results arrive for memberships and I have passed so I can now put a few extra letters after my name.

Animals to see today were a Woma Python with skin shedding issues and a Malayan Tapir with healing mouth ulcers; later Seabird Rescue brought in a pelican that has tangled with both a power line then barb-wire fence which required some minor surgery.

Weekend off but need to go to Melbourne on Sunday for cheetah collection.

See you all next time it is my turn if I don't forget.

Interview with the Courier newspaper first up for the Churchill fellowship, seemed to go well. Just before 10 the team starts to arrive for our big procedure today: semen collection from our aged male cheetahs.

The team includes some human reproduction specialist from Repromed, a comparative anatomist from the uni and a reproductive ecologist with two of his recent PhD students.

The knockdown and collection go well in the first one but the other male doesn't appear well enough to produce any sperm. Samples are stored in liquid nitrogen for future use.

No time for anything else and soccer training cancelled due to weather. At home get invite to first Churchill planning meeting next week.

With the exam now out of the way I can begin planning for the Winston Churchill Fellowship (http://www.churchilltrust.com.au) that I had been notified about late last week. These are short-term overseas travelling scholarships awarded to investigate specific projects with my topic on "Open-range zoo veterinary facilities" and visits planned to the USA, UK and South Africa.

Hi Everyone,

This week has been quite busy as usual. Our Head Vet has left for China to meet and work with the Giant Pandas which is very exciting.

Funny sort of a day today. Started off checking a few animals like the Mata Mata tortoise that's been on treatment for a skin infection, following by checking out the new exhibit for the mata matas that have just come from Rotterdam.

G'day this is Wayne Boardman, Head of Veterinary Conservation Programs at Zoos South Australia.

Just back from a conference on the Gold Coast – the Australasian Regional Association of Zoo Parks and Aquaria or ARAZPA, where amongst other things I gave a talk on some field work we undertook at Scotia in NSW health checking one of Australias more endangered species of wallaby, the Bridled Nailtail Wallaby.

Hi all, it's been another busy day. The serval was cleared from quarantine today which is great news, this means that soon she can be transferred to her new exhibit and will be eventually introduced to our male. We hope that they will breed in the future.

Hi everybody my name is Paula Modra and I am one of the Veterinary Nurses at Zoos SA, mainly working at Adelaide Zoo, but occasionally at Monarto. I have been with Zoos SA for over 7 years, and as Dianne said last week, I also love my job to bits and pieces!

Hi Again,

Well the day is nearly over but we still have lots to do. Mujambi's anaesthetic went really well and he has recovered beautifully so we are all really pleased. In total the procedure took 3 and a half hours!!

Hi Everyone,

My name is Dianne Hakof (aka DJ Disey!! But there's a story for another day!) and I am the Head Veterinary Nurse at Zoos SA. I have been with Zoos SA for 17 years and love my job to bits and pieces!

Went out to Cleland this morning as Lynley is off this week. Unfortunately we had to euthanase the mallee fowl she was treating for aspergillosis (a fungal infection in the lung).

Hello again from Dave.

Had a busy weekend even though I wasn't working! Saturday I came in to help Lynley anaesthetise our male lion Mujambi. He had a seizure on exhibit on Friday. This the second, possibly third, seizure that he has had, but this time one of the females attacked him while he was fitting and injured his back leg quite badly.