Day 4 of my trip to Indonesia (Sept 2009)

Dolphin Encounter

Today we went dolphin watching at Lovina beach in Bali; I give the trip mixed reviews. First, we had to ride out further than expected to get to deeper waters in hopes of seeing dolphins. This was actually okay because we enjoyed the ride and the scenery. But instead of seeing the horizon or having a postcard view of the coast we saw a brown haze. It was smog! From the cars, maybe from Java, and definitely from the boats, which are traditionally outriggers with ancient motors. Throughout the ride you could smell the fumes and hear the loud engines. Given that sound travels well under water, I can only imagine the effect on the fish. If I were a dolphin, I’d probably elect to avoid areas with boats and their noisy, polluting motors.

We did see a few dolphins, although not like the entire pod Asri’s sister saw on her last visit. Such things are not predictable. What I was really missing was information from the guide about the dolphins and their behavior. After the bird park experience from the day before, I wasn’t surprised that the guides didn’t know anything about the dolphins. They were really just boat drivers, and I guess most people are happy to look at animals without really learning anything about their lifestyle and habits. Seems like a huge missed opportunity to me, though.

On the way back we stop to peer over at the fish. At first I can’t see anything, but then the boat guide tell us they’ll come up if we toss food in. So I toss a bit of bread and sure enough tons of fish come teeming up to the top.

Overall it would have been nicer to make this experience more of an eco-adventure. That way if no dolphins are seen, it’s still a good learning experience. For that to happen, though, the guides need to learn quite a bit about dolphin social behavior, hunting, and communication.

Monkeys Everywhere

Later, on the way across the island, we stopped to observe A troop of crab-eating macaques by the side of the road. This troop is comprised of probably 5-10 families and spans several stops along the road. As I get out to take photos a local woman brings out a plate of bananas and says, “10,000 rupees.” She wants me to purchase bananas to feed the macaques. Now, in general, it’s not a good idea to feed wild animals, because pretty soon they’re taking the food from you and even biting to get it. Or, if they’re bears at Yosemite or another national park, they’re raiding your garbage can or breaking into your car. The driver tells us that these macaques by the side of the road are not yet very aggressive to humans. The ones in the Monkey Forests where many visitors go regularly grab food from people and grab sunglasses and other accessories because they know that people will need to use food to get their stolen items back.

At first I refuse to purchase bananas, but then I realize that no matter what, these monkeys are going to be trained by humans to grab food away eventually. So I get some bananas and take a photo for my Dumbass file. Me feeding a wild animal from a known aggressive species-looks harmless enough, but it’s not. I did make sure I gave the banana to the highest ranking female only when she was sitting rather than accidentally rewarding her for grabbing for it or jumping. Other visitors let the monkeys jump up and grab the food from them, and the local woman let one of the baby macaque jump on her.

What she probably doesn’t know is that a macaque bite can innoculate humans with herpes which leads to fatal brain disease. herpes virus-. And she probably doesn’t know how aggressive the macaque social system is. Macaques live in a female-dominated hierarchy. The females have a rank order and everyone in their family retains that rank relative to other families. So if you’re born into the family of a low ranking female, you’re out of luck. What’s more, they have what’s called a despotic social system in that they routinely maintain their rank by picking on others who are below them. In A research setting, if a high ranking monkey is removed for an extended period of time, serious fighting occurs as the rank order is upset.

Aggression is apparent with these macaques. The dominant female takes all of the food and none of the others around her can get a banana because she attacks them.

Note that like with the Bali dogs, these monkeys provide a glimpse into how domestication occurs. Domestication is a process occurring over many generations in which a population of animals becomes more adapted to living with humans. This process involves genetic changes. In contrast, tameness is a process that occurs within an animal’s lifetime by which animals become less fearful of humans. A tame animal is defined as one that does not flee from humans. As animals become tame, the distance to which a human can approach before the animal moves away (flight distance) decreases.

This troop of monkeys has become less fearful of humans, so they are tamer than monkeys living far away from humans. Because they are less fearful, they can make good use of food sources close to humans-such as trash, human food, and food that humans feed them. Over many generations as the most tame breed and reproduce well, the genetic make-up of the population can change so that the monkeys are easier to tame and more tame early on than populations in the jungle.

Sophia’s Indonesia Trip — Day 3 (Sept 2009)

Today we’ve arrived on Bali, an island described as Paradise and one also known for having many stray dogs.  Virtually all developing countries have many stray dogs and the dog population is a good reminder of how dogs co-evolved alongside man. That is, while a common idea is that humans purposefully domesticated dogs by stealing wolf pups from dens and then selectively breeding the ones they liked, this process would be labor intensive, especially considering the fact that, even now, to get a tame wolf you must hand rear them starting before 14 days of age.

An alternate hypothesis to the labor intensive and potentially hazardous method of plucking wolf pups from the den and then hand-raising them is the model of self-domestication supported by Darcy Morey, as well as Ray and Lorna Coppinger. This hypothesis says that as humans moved into permanent settlements, they also developed trash sites that some wolves were able to exploit for food. Those that were the tamest or least fearful and best able to scavenge in this environment survived and reproduced better. Their pups inherited this degree of tameness and, in turn, survived better than their peers.

In time, such populations of “village wolves” arose in many different settlements around the world. Due to the decreased fear in these village wolves, humans were able to interact with them easily. At first, they started playing favorites by tossing food to those individuals they liked best, with no specific goals for long-term artificial breeding programs. Then, at a more recent point in time, humans started to systematically select dogs for specific traits, which led to the development of many different dog breeds.

This method of self-domestication is supported by findings in other animals, as well as in the current state of the world’s dogs. Three quarters of the world’s dog populations live in developing nations as village dogs. Like the model of the village wolf, they scavenge from human discards and are considered pests rather than pets. Bali is a good glimpse into how this system works.

Bali is Overrun with Dogs

Janice Ghirardi from Bawabali.com estimates about 1 dog to every 5 people here. Based on our morning drive from the airport all the way to the other side of the island, these numbers are likely to be true. On our drive we see about one dog every minute. Most that I see have clear signs of mange, a skin problem caused by either demodectic or sarcoptic mites. The primary sign is intense itchiness and hair loss due to scratching. The skin is red from inflammation and scratching and over time can become thickened and black. One of the most common postures I see as we drive by dogs is the sitting-itching posture.

Most of the dogs have a tired look on their face because the skin condition has caused their ears to tilt forward. I can’t yet tell whether the dogs are happy or just getting by since I only see them while we drive by. But I hope to interact with dogs later on in our trip. I’ll also get a better idea later on whether most dogs look as bad as the ones I see on my first day in Bali.

Dogs and Cars

With dogs so close to the road, you might think that these dogs have an innate ability to avoid cars. But as we’re driving on the main 2-lane road, I do see dogs walking right into the street. Due to the crazy driving style here-where you learn that actually 3, not 2, cars can fit in a 2 lane road- drivers here are more alert and ready to avoid dogs as well as other cars, people and motorcycles. In spite of this, many dogs are still hit by cars. According to Janice Ghirardi, Bawabali easily gets 5 calls a day from people who’ve reported dogs hit by cars. A majority of people on the island wouldn’t know who to call, however, so there are many more killed that they never hear about.

Sophia’s Indonesia Trip, Day 3 (Sept 2009)

Impressive Hornbills

On day 3 of my Indonesia vacation and our first day on Bali, we stop and visit Bird Park. The park has the standard variety of parrots, most of which are also present at other zoos.  But they have a large collection of hornbills, which most other zoos do not. These large birds form monogamous pairs and live in tree holes and crevices. When the female is ready to lay eggs she builds a wall of mud and droppings to seal the opening and seals herself in. The opening is only large enough for the male to deliver food to her and the chicks. When the chicks are too large for the crevice, the female breaks out and both the male and female find food for the chicks. The female may stay in the crevice for up to 100 days!

One impressive characteristic of hornbills is the heavy, powerful bill, which they use for capturing prey, breaking open fruit/nuts (hornbills are omnivorous), building the nest, and fighting. All hornbill species have a hollow structure called a casque on the top of their beak. In most species with large casques, the casques have hollow openings and may serve as a resonator or amplifier for their vocalizations. One hornbill species, the rhinocerous hornbill, has a more solid casque, which it uses while fighting during flight.

Rare Cassowaries

Here’s a cassowary, which is a flightless bird related to the ostrich (from Africa) and emu (from Australia). They have feathers but these feathers lack barbules, the part of feathers that act like a zipper to keep the pieces together. As a result, the cassowary feathers are soft and fluffy rather than holding their shape the way a flighted bird’s feathers do.

Cassowarys are solitary whereas ostriches and emus live in flocks. As breeding season nears, the female becomes more tolerant to males. Males court females by strutting in a circle around the female and calling to her in a series of loud booms. If the female likes the male she’ll form a pair bond and mate. The two stay together until the female lays eggs, which she places in a pile on the ground in a shallow nest made of leaves. Once the female has laid her green eggs, she moves on, leaving the male to incubate the eggs and look after the hatchlings. Like the female emu or ostrich, she may then find and breed with another male and lay another clutch of eggs. So the cassowary mating system is serial polyandry, meaning the female bonds and mates with multiple males in series.

The male cassowary sits on his nest for up to 2 months. Once the chicks hatch, he leads them to his regular feeding grounds and protects them. They may stay with him for up to 16 months before they disperse, which the male encourages them to do by chasing them off.

As an aside, this mating system is a little different from ostriches. Ostriches live in mixed age and sex groups. Males mate with numerous females who lay their eggs in a group nest, but they only pair with one of these females-who is called the major female for that nest. The major female’s eggs sit near the center of the nest, and she may roll the eggs of other females out of the nest. In the wild, females seasonally lay eggs every two days for about 4 weeks. The breeding seasons varies depending on geographic location. Clutches in the wild may contain 12-23 eggs from 3-5 different hens with up to 11 eggs from the “major hen.” Since birds lay eggs in additional nests, though, this count may be higher than noted. In captivity, domestic birds can average 70 or more eggs per season.

Humans Leaving Their Mark

As usual, humans have difficulty leaving things they way they found them. Here, humans have graffitied the fruit.

Overall Impression of the Park

While the birds and the actual park are beautiful here, the signs and educational shows are more about providing photo opportunities than providing information. If you really want to know about the different types of birds, look up birds of Indonesia before you come. Most of the information I’ve presented here is information I already knew or looked up.

While many parrot owners let these beautiful birds ride on their shoulders, most owners

specializing in bird or animal behavior as well as skilled bird trainers avoid letting them ride like this.

Even friendly birds can become aggressive and easily poke the closest thing to their beak. For instance, if the bird becomes angry or scared at another object it may redirect it’s aggression to your face (note the proximity of your eyes to the parrots beak). Or when a bird is trying to keep its mate from interacting with another individual, it frequently directs aggression towards its mate. Birds raised by humans may view their human as their mate and try to keep the human mate from interating with others.

Note: Stay tuned for more blogs by Sophia Yin on her Bali trip at www.AskDrYin.com/blog.

By Sophia Yin, DVM, MS  September 24, 2009

In these difficult times, it can be challenging to care for your pet and to know when you’re getting the most appropriate care. In fact one pet owner once wrote to me for advise regarding what to expect from her vet. “Dr. Yin, she says, “ I no longer trust veterinarians to practice ethical medicine. Three years ago, our newly-purchase guinea pig showed signs of mite infestation. A vet specializing in exotic animals put her on a two-shot course of ivermectin. After the second shot a week after the first, she went into convulsions. There was an emergency room visit with follow-up at the vet’s office. She recovered but a month later the mites returned. I brought her to a different vet who treated her with flea powder, a much less invasive approach. This cured her.”

She went on to explain another case. “We also had a male cat with terrible “blood crystals” which caused severe urinary problems. Medications didn’t help and neither did surgery. It was a stressful time as I was due to give birth. Our poor cat was no longer the playful, affectionate companion we loved. I brought him to the vet for assistance and he insisted on giving heart medications. I tried this and he didn’t improve. We had to have the cat put down the day I came home from the hospital.”

These situations gave the owner a bad taste. And made her wonder: What should pet owners expect from veterinarians? How do we know what the standard of care should be?

These are good questions and they also remind me of something a veterinarian colleague once said, “Instead of giving us all of those classes and a diploma at graduation, they should have just given us a crystal ball and a magic wand. Clients would be happier.”

But we graduated with neither which is why veterinarians can’t predict the future any better than the Wall Street experts can predict the stocks, bookies can predict exact Superbowl outcomes, and the every-day individual can predict what will go wrong the next time he upgrades the operating system on his man-made PC.

Even when your veterinarian follows a diagnostic and treatment plan devised by God himself, which for mite infestations in guinea pigs currently involves a 1-4 shot course of ivermectin at 1-2 week intervals, patients may respond poorly. What’s more, cures are only temporary if the inciting causes, such as mites on neighboring guinea pigs, aren’t stamped out too.

The problem is that fixing an ailing pet is not like fixing a car or TV or someone’s bathroom sink. It’s more like solving a mystery and trapping the source. When looking for the culprit, detectives don’t just ask which one test in the sure-fire solution. Instead the answer requires a pain-staking search for multiple pieces of the puzzle. A mold of a suspicious footprint, a search for telltale stains, analysis of DNA, interviews with anyone remotely involved. Gather the right pieces and the picture takes shape, but the process takes time and skill and different detective teams may come to the solution through different steps.

Similarly, to diagnose your pet’s problem, a thorough physical examination plus the owner’s detailed account are an important start and may do the job. But many cases also require multiple tests. Each test can reveal something different but the puzzles picture is revealed only when all the pieces come together.

This can add up quickly. As pet owners ourselves, we veterinarians know. We often perform the ultimate work-ups and treatments on our own pets with ideal or less than ideal results. For me to the tune of $1500 for my cattledog several years back and for one of my classmates $4000.00 for her 14 year old Rhodesian Ridgeback. And my family’s aged Scottie it involved diagnostics for lymphosarcoma, and a splenectomy which cost us for about $2000.00 even with my huge veterinary discount. The surgery and chemotherapy provided the dog with 3 good months, followed by remission and then euthanasia. It was a short remission but well worth it for us.

A cat with urinary tract disease would put any veterinarian on red alert. It could get better on its own but it could also mean a long recurring problem that might involve surgery without being completely resolved. And if all else failed or even before, we might also choose to treat less pressing or obvious problems such as a heart condition or the stressful environmental situation going on at home in the hopes that that’s what’s throwing the cat’s system over the edge.

While you may not be able to afford all the tests or treatments it’s your veterinarian’s job to offer you the Gold Standard in care and work down from there rather than to judge your financial situation or the strength of your bond with your pet and offer you less. When vets make assumptions about what owners can afford Kitty may get short-changed. When owners continuously complain about being offered the best, they may no longer get such offers.

As a pet owner, your job is to decide what you can afford, and what you think is best for your entire family. Your vet should do his best to work within your needs, giving you options and then help you weigh your chances. This partnership works best when clients establish a regular relationship that involves annual pet check-ups, follow agreed-upon treatments to the tee, and appear for scheduled rechecks even when the problem seems cured. This allows the vet to understand your pet better, to modify treatments based on your pet’s response and to further discuss any questions you may have. If you’re still unsure about your pet’s care, keep asking questions, or seek a second opinion from a board certified veterinary specialist. Have your records sent first so that the specialist can get a complete view. But please remember, even specialists don’t graduate with a crystal ball.

For more information on pet diseases check out the following veterinary-sponsored web page: http://www.VeterinaryPartner.com

For dog owners check out “Speaking for Spot: Be the Advocate Your Dog Needs to Live a Happy, Healthy, Longer Life” by veterinarian, Dr. Nancy Kay. (www.amazon.com)

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