AK-Conservation Station-vet operations

[molitva]

The recent blog posts about AK has me thinking about our day in AK for Dec 12.

It's just me and DBF, who is a vet student. I've read somewhere that sometimes you can catch vets performing operations/procedures on animals at the Conservation Station. Does anyone have any more information on that? Any idea when the best time of the day (or maybe week) might be best to try to catch something like this? Has anyone seen it first hand?

I'm wondering if it's worth the schlep out to the Conservation Station to try to see one of these. And if it's just going to be a vaccination that's probably not worth it to us either. I'm not interested in the petting zoo aspect or reading any educational signs.

Thoughts? Thanks!

[fizboBunny]

I think I read somewhere that they do the vet stuff in the morning. I don't think they have a set schedule of what procedures and such they perform, but I'd be willing to bet they do more Mon - Fri than the weekend.

[off2neverland]

Brad at Stitch Kingdom has info on the vet procedures- about 3/4 way down on this page

http://www.stitchkingdom.com/planetwatch/

[Tinkerkell]

Vet procedures happen in the morning. We've watched a few and it was interesting. Sometimes a procedure will be scheduled, but there will be a delay for a number of reasons (just like when you go to the doctor) so allow plenty of time if you want to watch a procedure. There are TV screens if you do not have a place in front of the glass window.

[molitva]

Thanks for the input and link!

The Stitch Kingdom review says there are monitors that should list the procedures for the morning-sounds wonderful. I won't mind waiting around if it's going to be interesting. Now to figure out how to work this into the morning touring plan.

[pfalcioni]

And you can always play with the goats and pigs in the petting zoo while you wait :)

[DoctorK]

We tried to watch one, but there were so many people in the operating room (they were working on a pygmy marmoset) that the only way we could see anything was on the monitors, which weren't very good quality. If I was going to be headed that way anyway I would check it out, but I wouldn't devote the amount of time it takes to get there, wait for the procedure and get back just for the off chance it was something cool and also visible.

[Ferg]

...but I'd be willing to bet they do more Mon - Fri than the weekend.

Does anyone know if this is actually the case or is it truly a 7 day-a-week vet procedure room?

[pfalcioni]

We were there on a Sunday and they'd just finished an emergency dental procedure on an animal that morning, they mentioned it because they said it was unusual to have any procedures scheduled over the weekend.

[Ferg]

Thanks! That is helpful to know. Wouldn't want to go out there on a weekend if that was the main reason for going.

[Ferg]

Which makes me wonder, how would they know an animal was in need of an "emergency dental procedure?" How do they know it has a toothache? Or that it broke a tooth on breakfast? I get finding it during an exam, but just curious how an animal would tell them "Ouch! My tooth hurts!"

[pfalcioni]

I just assumed when they went in the cage in the morning, the animal was wearing one of these:

[Ferg]