Thelonius is an 11 week old baby Grey-Headed Flying-Fox who was found hanging low on a telegraph pole. The lovely Member of Public (MOP) waited until I arrived.
He appeared to have a fracture in his elbow, but his wing wasn't hanging quite right and there may have been an issue in his shoulder as well.
Normally I would euthanase any bat with this injury, but so many batties have died lately that I was unwilling to euthanase a baby who has more healing capacity than adults, if I could find someone to pin or externally fixate the fracture. I managed to line up a vet surgeon with the proviso that the X-ray would be the defining factor as to whether or not this was possible.
I couldn't get an X-ray till the next day, so we arranged for X-ray plus or minus euthanasia depending on the type of fracture. He was given pain relief and I put him to bed on a teddy, with a dummy.
Unfortunately he didn't survive the night. Like the other babies who are dying unexpectedly, he went grizzly and flinching and very unhappy, and died overnight. He was alive at midnight and 4am, but was dead around 6am.
RIP Thelonius.
I sent his body off to the zoo for necropsy. Initial gross results showed that he had soft long bones and bleeding in his lungs.
It's starting to be a pattern. I await results of the pathology and histopathology and microbiology.
