Don't be a pooter, spay and neuter

June 7th- June 9th

Sorry I couldn't post yesterday but it's been a very busy weekend that I cant wait to tell you all. So Friday we woke up bright and early and drove about an hour away to a farm to do some horse physicals. We were expecting the usual muddy and dirty farm, but this place was amazing. It looked more like a ranch than a farm, where there was a three story house which the people there said they use to keep family and relatives who visit. It had like three hammocks to lay on, which we all raced each other to get on. The owners also had about 5 dogs and a kitty, and as huge animals lovers, we couldn't resist playing with them.

The hammocks are on the second floor, but you can't really see them here.

Dogs love to swim too :)

The most friendliest dogs ever !

Our day started off with doing a spay on the owners kitten. By this time I've seen and done so many, the procedure is so simple now.

Dr. Eduardo and Jennifer performing the spay.

After the spay, we split up into pairs and performed horse physicals. One of the horses had a large wound on his head, so we were able to clean it and put some antibiotic medication.

Sorry I couldn't rotate this one.

There were about 12 horses including a donkey, so there was enough for each to do at least one. We checked for the horses general appearance, and then proceeded to listen to the heartbeat and the lungs. We found the number of respirations and then administered dewormer and vitamin B-12 to each horse.

Mommy and her two-day old baby <3

Once we were all finished, the owner was so nice enough to let us do a two hour horseback ride. On tuesday when we did horseback, I fell off one of the horses because the stirrups were too long on my horse and so my feet would slip out. Fortunately I didnt get injured, but I was a little scared to ride again, but I'm glad I did. We had the people who knew how to ride go first, and then those with little experience go after, which worked out well. The owner made sure my stirrups were well secured :)

Saturday was a very busy but extremely exciting/fun day. Saturday we got to set up a spay/neuter clinic which was optional, but who would want to miss that. We set up an empty building to resemble that of a clinic, where you would sign in, take a seat and wait to get a physical exam done, and then if you wanted your dog to get spayed or neutered they would go into surgery. This was probably the most exciting for me because it resembled so much like a clinic, and I hope to come back home and start working as a volunteer in a vet clinic to get the full experience. I know I probably wont be able to do much, but at least I got the experience in Belize. 

Our very first patients!!!

We're that awesome, we got a waiting room started.

So yeah, we got about 60 dogs, of which 2 were neutered and about 7-8 got spayed. We tried to get more people into neutering their dogs, which is better in the long run, but some said they needed their dogs to breed. After all, everything was free. We gave deworming and vitamin medication, and even the neutering/spaying all for FREE. We volunteered our time to help out the Belizian community, which is simply amazing, and Im glad some people were appreciative and used their resources wisely. It was great to see how much people really enjoyed having us take care of their dogs, and I could see in every single one of them how much trust they had in us. Not that we aren't good, but I wouldn't know if I would trust a college student operating my dog.

The physical exam area 

Right behind physical exam was the operating area !

Guess who was lucky enough to get to operate??

Yes, me !!!!!

I swear they're only asleep !!! lol

Pretty darn good I would say 

Just some of our patients, aren't they so cutee?

More spaying. Tough having white fur.

Medication timee !

He was a strong one. Good thing we have one guy in the group lol

Later that night we had a little taste of how the night life is here in Belize. We decided to head out to the Casino in San Ignacio, which also had a lounge. It was a great night; we danced all night and had some drinks. We actually didn't think we would have as much fun as we did, but I was glad we did. I wish I had pictures, but they wouldn't let us bring in cameras into the casino :(

Today (Sunday) was free day, so the whole group decided to go water tubing. We got a great deal on it, so we figured why not. It was about an hour and a half ride from the resort, but it was worth it. I've never been cave tubing, and I'm glad my first time was with a large group of people or it would have been frightening. We actually got to ride through caves (yes there were some bats), so it was very dark, but we had headlights on. We had a great tour guide who explained how people used to believe caves were passages into the underworld and such and legends that they had. The ride was about an hour or so long, and near the exit we got to jump of cliffs and dive into the water, which was awesome ! Definetely a great experience, and I'm glad we did it. (I dont have any pictures, since my camera wasn't water proof, but I'll try to upload some from others cameras)

- Alejandra Villalobos