Update on baby elephant 4-6-13

     The baby elephant died thurs night in spite of valiant efforts by Gary Roberts and many others. Everyone knew that the chances were slim but it was worth a try to save it. They say elephants are very emotional animals. This baby had lost his family when the slaughter occurred and then had been tied up for a week before Gary obtained it and flew it over here from an area Out of a heard of over a hundred elephants near the Cameroon border about half of them were killed in a massacre recently. This one baby was saved temporarily but he succumbed to depression and loneliness. We put in a feeding tube and it seemed to revive perhaps a day. They say even in elephant orphanages the success rate is only about 50%. He was a cute affectionate little guy only about 200 lbs.
     Our second man in a week to be bitten by a hippo came in Friday.  His bite was not quite as massive as the first one but it was through and through his left thigh. The previous was also left thigh. The previous one tore out a bunch of muscle which we tried to repair but part of it appears that it will need to be debrided some more. What bacteria does a hippo mouth have? We don’t know so we are giving lots of antibiotics to both men.
     Today, Sunday, after doing rounds on patients I worked on cement mixers. One had a bearing completely “frozen” and would not turn so had to be torn apart.  No new parts so have to make this work. It apparently had not been greased in a long time so had grooves in the shaft etc but with some filing to knock off the roughest spots we put it back together and it worked and grease was put in. Gary Roberts came down to work on the other one that was diesel motor. Apparrently dirty fuel had clogged the filter and the pump and the injector nozzle. It has been cleaned out now and it runs. Perhaps the compression is not as good as it should be. It had been run some with no air filter. Some of these locals just don’t understand how important clean fuel and lubrication are. Maybe sabatoge was involved also as a piece of cement sack paper about 6 inches size was found in the fuel tank the other day. Cement does not work good in fuel system. Don’t know how much was on the piece of paper. Anyway they are operative now.
     It is still hot and Zane is still having an elevated temp but not last night as he was in an air conditioned room down to 88 degrees. Whether he has some infection or some problem with temperature regulation we don’t know. He acts pretty normal most of the time. Pray that it is nothing of consequence.
Our emails:      drbland@sbcglobal.net and dfbland01@gmail.com
Love, Rollin and Dolores