Pinned pintail.

I'm sitting in my kitchen, enjoying a chocolate chip muffin, hearing a discovery channel program on reindeer in the background, and thinking happily back on my day. This morning we went to retrieve a pintail duckling who had been limping. Upon examination, we saw that his tiny, grey leg was much more bent than it had originally been. It was time to do xrays. While we set the machines up, we put the little fluffy guy in a carrier. His repeated meek peeps of distress broke my heart. We took a few photographs of his legs, and I worked clumsily in the dark to develop the film. Once the picture was ready for viewing and we put it up, we saw a clearly broken leg. Now, considering you can't give a baby duck crutches and explain to him how not to put weight on his leg, we had to add some support. The bone required pinning. I got surgery set up, preparing a heating pad for the small body. When under anesthesia, animals lose thermoregulation, and so it is very important for us to take measures to keep their body temperature normal. The beak the size of my pinky fit easily into a mask, and he was asleep in no time. My job was to watch ribs rise and fall, occasionally taking a respiration rate. The addition of the pins and stabilizing putty to hold his leg bone in place was a quick procedure. When we were finished, we woke the little guy up easily, and he was pretty ready to get away from us! He strongly resisted as I gave him a mouthful of pain medication, spitting and hissing at me. However, after all that work, we got him set up in a crate filled with a fluffy towel in a warm room with some food and water, and he seemed like a much happier man...we'll know for sure in a week to ten days when we remove the pins and recheck the bones. Today was my first time seeing a bird surgery, and it seemed to be a successful one!