Animal Handling: The Smallies

As part of Animal Behaviour, Handling, and Welfare last year, you might guess that we needed to handle some animals. I described our adventures with the large animals in the last post, leaving dogs and cats.

Of the two, I had cats first. This was at a cat research centre that is depicted as a blank square on the campus map. Apparently, if they actually label it, animal rights people that don't know what they're doing will show up and try to set all the cats free. 

The place is a bit of a mystery to enter. It was way out of the way, interspersed with other mysterious buildings, and the entrance was locked. Peering in through the door, I could only make out a rather dark hallway. When they let us in, we had to all squeeze by each other and put plastic booties on over our shoes, then trickle down to a room with a bunch of cages on the walls and some tables in between. One by one, the people that worked there brought in cats.

The next three hours were filled with picking up cats. We'd pick them up and pin them down in a variety of awkward positions. This was mostly practice for trying to access veins, and as these cats are pretty used to the weekly vet student thing, they weren't too bothered. That is, until we had to pill them.

Using cat food as "pills," we had to hold a kibble in one hand, and with the other hand sort of awkwardly secure the cat to your side, and at the same time hold its head back. You then deftly open the cats mouth with the pinky of the hand holding your kibble, and shove it as far down their throat as you can. Cats teeth are sharp, and they certainly have no intention of cooperating with you trying to open their mouth.

I walked out of that place with a small number of scratches and a large number of cat hairs on my lab coat. This is painfully obvious because lab coats are white.

The final handling lab I had was dogs. There were only three dogs, and they were large, furry, floppy, happy dogs. One or two of them had been teaching dogs for something like ten years. They were so happy and relaxed, it was a little bit difficult to learn anything, because the dog knew what you were up to and would help you out. When you're trying to practice restraining a dog, having them lie limply in the exact position you want will not vastly improve your skill.

When it came time to practicing pilling these guys, you can imagine how the dogs felt about kibbles. One of my partners wasn't very good at it, or maybe the dog was just being clever, but he got four or five kibbles out of her. I had a pretty good time in that lab, right up until they gave us treats at the end to reward the dogs and have them do tricks if we wanted. I had one of those big, thick biscuits, so I tried to break it in half. In doing so, I sliced my finger open. On a dog treat.