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Jaguar gets new smile thanks to Valley team

 
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GTG
Was lost but now am found




Joined: 30 Dec 2002
Posts: 2387
Location: Peoria, Arizona, originally from Rocket City, USA

PostPosted: 11/24/2008, 11:53 am    Post subject: Jaguar gets new smile thanks to Valley team Reply to topic Reply with quote


From today's Arizona Republic -
http://www.azcentral.com/community/scottsdale/articles/2008/11/24/20081124sr-jaguar1125.html
Quote:

Jaguar gets new smile thanks to Valley team
1 commentby Kate Nolan - Nov. 24, 2008 10:33 AM
The Arizona Republic
A Scottsdale veterinary dentist and his son, a human dentist, led a team of doctors in undoing life-threatening dental damage suffered by an endangered Mexican jaguar.

A rancher in southern Sonora had trapped the rare cat in a small box trap and kept him there for nearly 10 months.

The jaguar, estimated to be 3 to 4 years old, broke off all four of his canine teeth and ground three incisors to stumps trying to gnaw his way through the metal cage.
Mexican authorities confiscated the cat in January 2007 and placed him in a 400-acre zoo in Hermosillo.

"The tooth damage resulted in infection that could kill the animal. He experienced a lot of pain and needed the best medical care. That was not possible in Mexico," said Dr. Benjamin Alcantar of the Centro Ecologico De Sonora, the state run zoo in Hermosillo.

Phoenix zoologists heard about the problem and called Dr. Chris Visser of Scottsdale, one of the leading experts in the country on the dental care of exotic animals.

Visser often donates his services to the zoo through his Aid Animal Dental Clinic in Scottsdale.

For the Mexican cat's complicated work - four root canals and three extractions - Visser assembled anesthesiologist Victoria Lukasik and his son, Louis Visser, a dentist for humans who has trained in veterinary dentistry. Assisting were Dr. Brian de Guzman, a cardiovascular surgeon from St. Joseph's Medical Center. The zoo's chief veterinarian, Dean Rice, and Alcantar were also involved.

But the appointment had to wait a year until last Friday while the paperwork that spelled out the delicate process of shipping a protected species between nations was approved.

The Arizona Game and Fish Department, which partners with Sonora on a jaguar conservation project, accepted responsibility for the cat and its one-year residence at the Phoenix Zoo.

The U.S. has listed jaguars as endangered since 1997. Four have been spotted in the state near the border, although Phoenix was once part their range.

The cat's procedure began at 7:28 a.m. Friday, when he was darted with an anesthetic as he dozed in the quarantine cage he is mandated to occupy for his first 30 days in the U.S.

Doped up, he was weighed, tipping the scales at 132 pounds, larger than the average weight range of 80 to 100 pounds for jaguars in northern Sonora.

The jaguar would stay under for the next six hours, monitored by Lukasik, one of the few board-certified animal anesthesiologists in the country.

First the jaguar's teeth were X-rayed. Then the Vissers drilled, rinsed, ground and cut within his clamped-open mouth as his giant scarlet tongue flopped to one side.

Shawn Groves, a member of the zoo's Dangerous Animal Response Team, sat nearby with a rifle in his lap, a precaution taken for all big animals. In eight years on the job, Groves has never fired a shot.


Lukasik was satisfied with the blood pressure readings, an area of special risk in veterinary anesthesia.

When the elder Visser stitched up the extraction sockets at about 11:30 a.m., he finally relaxed.

"One reason we can do this is the Pet Memorial Program," he said, standing beside his sleeping patient.

The funding tool raises money to provide special veterinary care for the zoo's animals. In the past two years, the effort has paid $200,000 for sophisticated technology, such as digital X-ray equipment, he said. Plans are under way to help equip the clinic at the Hermosillo zoo.

If all goes well, the cat will be on public display at the Phoenix zoo in three weeks. Visser will examine him in six months. A good report could signal the start of a breeding program, mating the visiting male with the zoo's lone female jaguar. Meanwhile, his DNA will be studied.


How cool is that? Sucks for the jag but I'm glad they could fix him up. Maybe they should put him back in that box WITH the rancher now?

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PageRob





Joined: 03 Mar 2005
Posts: 859
Location: Page, Az.

PostPosted: 11/24/2008, 5:35 pm    Post subject: Reply to topic Reply with quote

Man, I would love for there to be a breeding program for jaguars in Phx...could pave the way for an active reintroduction of Jaguars in AZ and NM.
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GTG
Was lost but now am found




Joined: 30 Dec 2002
Posts: 2387
Location: Peoria, Arizona, originally from Rocket City, USA

PostPosted: 11/24/2008, 6:42 pm    Post subject: Reply to topic Reply with quote

More pictures up now -





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