Well, crap.

If you're ever asked to go retrieve a smelly glove that has something squishy inside, be skeptical, because you're probably about to get into what I did today. I carried my gotten item from the fridge to the lab, and carefully untied the latex knot. Pungent odors wafted to my nostrils and sent my stomach churning. I was informed that I was working with zebra poop. Despite its unfortunate beginnings, running a fecal sample is actually a quite exciting adventure. After agitating the excrement and adding float solution, you place a slide atop the liquid and wait for what is containing possible parasites to cling to the glass. The zebra slide was not too interesting--all I saw was pieces of forage and air bubbles.

However, upon peering through the lenses of the microscope at a toad's sample, I saw a slide teeming with little grainy brown circles. These circles are parasites called Strongyles and they use the toad as a nice vacation lodge, where they can hang out and get all the food they need to survive and reproduce. The toad in question had not been feeling well, and was not responding to the treatment he has been on for two weeks, and the parasites could be a contributing factor to that. He was wormed later in the day, and we hope to see improvement in his condition soon.

In my afternoon, we did a walk through of the zoo, to view and do a quick check of each of the animals. I also spent much time in a ninety degree room, sweat pouring down my face as I scrubbed bird poop off of branches using a toothbrush. When an animal first moves to a zoo, before they see the public, they are kept in what is called quarantine. The vet staff will attend to the animal, providing its daily care and monitoring it's blood, feces, and behavior regularly. When we go into a quarantined area, we must don protective suits made of a white plastic that traps all heat within and clings to sweaty skin, as well as gloves and rubber boots. These keep our outside germs from entering the quarantined area. The amount of time that animals are kept in quarantine varies depending on species and if they will be handled by the public or not. The birds that left today had been with us for 60 days, because they were being moved to the aviary, where people can feed them from seed sticks. They were three lovely cockatiels with happy little songs and happy little yellow mohawks. Thoroughly cleaning and bleaching and toothbrush scrubbing the area where they had been housed with us for two months was not so difficult when I remembered their new home in the aviary. They will now fly with many other birds of blues and yellows and whites and greens, all eager to eat of seeds on sticks held by eager little hands framed by smiling little faces.