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Back Country Surgery

by Maryann Rizzo

While out running the dogs at the farms one day a few months ago, my husband noticed a bird flopping around in the snow-covered fields.

He pointed this out to me and asked me if I wanted him to "chase it down" as he thought he could run faster than a flightless bird... and he was right.

On closer inspection I noted that it was a Snow Bunting and one wing was damaged.  We took the bird home and I bandaged the wing with vet wrap, which is a crinkly, stretchy material that adheres to itself. I put this on for three days, and treated the bird like a canary in regards to feeding as it is in this family.

After three days, I inspected the wing to find out where it was broken, only to find that the breast on the same side had a HUGE gash in it for such a small bird.  The cut must have been 1 inch long by 1/2 inch deep, which is shockingly large for a small bird. The shoulder was also shattered.

I called two veterinarians since most vets will treat wild animals for free.  Both vets declined treatment or surgery because they feared the bird would die under anaesthetic.

So I called my other vet and purchased two surgical needles with proper surgical thread. I informed the vet that the wound on the breast had dried edges and knowing I would need fresh pink flesh that had a good blood supply in order to heal over, I knew I had to debride the wound (the surgical removal of lacerated, necrotic or contaminated tissue). This entailed using a surgical scalpel and GENTLY scraping the surface of the breast to draw out fresh blood. I don't remember how I knew this, (I must have seen or heard this terminology before on television), but I did know that it had to be done.

I decided to give it a go myself. There was a major problem though. Birds being handled will get very scared FAST, and their heart rate ramps up to over 600 beat per minute, and this alone can kill them. So I had to handle the bird at 30-second intervals to inspect the damage and plan my strategy of surgery.

Even though I have read that you can just take a needle and thread and sew the bird up, I thought that it might fight if and when it did in fact feel pain. But then I had an epiphany! Dental gel! I had two tubes of Oragel, the topical ointment put on sore teeth and gums, when you can’t immediately get to a dentist. I thought that I would put this on the surgical site before I gave any medical treatment. But first I put some on MY gums and skin of my hand and timed the activation of numbness and the duration… it took 30 seconds to take effect and lasted for 4 1/2 minutes. This was my window of opportunity to perform the surgery.

I numbed the breast, but when I tried to put in the curved needle the vet had supplied me with, it bent like a pretzel, it was WAY too small to go through this tough little breast. After two bent needles, I gave up and let the bird rest for the night.

The next day, after re-reading my OLD bird book, I discovered that I could use silk thread and a normal needle, so off I went again. I began with the plucking of the feathers near the wound, then the surgical iodine, followed by the Orajel, and then the debriding.  As my husband held the bird, I drove the needle through the breast without even a flinch from the bird. The Orajel worked AMAZINGLY.  So far so good, and better than I had expected. I couldn’t believe how sinewy the muscle of this little critter was. After giving one stitch, we would release the bird to run around the bathroom floor to lower the heart rate. We did this two more times, for a total of three stitches. Part one of surgery was complete. 

The wing was slathered in Polysporyn and rewrapped, and the bird was left to recover for a week.

 With instructions from the vet in regard to stitching, we were supposed to tie the knots right over left and left over right 4 times over, resulting in a square knot.

Well, you can imagine a bird the size of a sparrow and my shaky hands, and the BIG FAT thumb and fingers of my husband’s mechanic hands.  It was quite the trick.

The first attempt didn’t go very well.  Then after sleeping on it over night, I suddenly remembered the method I had seen over and over again in the days I had worked for the vet clinic.

I wasn’t using the hemostats!!! (tweezer-like tool)  I had tied the knots with my fingers.

The next round of stitches went off without a hitch.  Holding the end of the stitch with my finger and then wrapping the thread around the hemostats twice, grabbing the end of the stitch with the hemostats and pulling through was a piece of cake!  We then could get the stitch nice and tight.  This was THE formula for great success!  So we used this method for surgical procedure part two.

Then began surgery, part two. The stitches were removed and now the skin had to be sutured together. If the bird was ever to use the wing, even for balance, then the skin needed to be stitched as well. We followed the same procedure as for the breast muscle and were successful.

During this recovery time though, there was a slight complication and I noticed that the bird was holding the wing out a bit. I had not wrapped the wing this time in order to let air get to the wound to heal it faster. I also continued to apply ointment daily. I noticed that the stitch material was collecting dried blood, and a large scab had formed on the stitches, so I removed the blood and cut the stitch out and the wound healed completely.

If the wing was not hanging down a bit from a broken shoulder, you never would have guessed that was the side that had this great horrid gash. I showed my husband the healed bird and he was rather shocked. He said, and I quote, "You would never have convinced me in a million years that that wound would have healed so perfectly".

I put the bird back into his cage with a HUGE smile of satisfaction on my face.

We named him "Stitch".

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