Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
It was extremely dangerous to do tail docking by the roadside, with sedation being the bulk of the problem.
In a proper hospital, there would be a dedicated anesthetist stationed in each operating room. Veterinary hospitals had specialized anesthetists, too.
It was even more difficult to sedate an animal than a human, as different animals had different tolerances to sedation. If it was too low a dose, the animal would wake up before the surgery was over, but if they gave too much, the animal wouldn’t wake up. Therefore, they would have to weigh the animals before surgery and administer the right amount of sedation according to that.
But this vet wasn’t running an official clinic, nor did he prepare a scale. He had determined everything through his own experience and judgment. He picked up a puppy and estimated its approximate weight before preparing everything.
With the amount of experience he had under his belt, his weighing method might have been accurate, but it looked unreliable to its spectators. Just like the ladies at food canteens preparing food, they might have to adjust the portion, but it would always reach the plate with the right amount every time.
( NovelFull ) The vet drew up the appropriate amount of xylazine with the syringe according to the puppy’s weight before putting the puppy onto the table and injecting the sedative. The drug worked quickly, and the dog was under in seconds.
He shaved the hair from the puppy’s ear, then used a cotton bud to disinfect the ear, both in and outside the canal. He threw away the cotton bud and, pinching both ears so that they were upright, measured their lengths with his finger. He mumbled under his breath, “Effin’ Christ, different lengths again…”
Ears were completely made out of skin and cartilage, so it was common for them to be different lengths and sizes. After measuring the length, the vet picked up a pair of small scissors, nipping the ear as a mark, in case he ended up docking a pair of ears that had different sizes.
Snowy couldn’t bear looking anymore and turned her head away, still making sure that her phone was filming the scene.
The vet fished out a face mask that had been washed god knew when, wearing it without much concern. It wasn’t to be pretentious, but instead, it was because he didn’t want to be caught on film—since he was doing something illegal here.
The owner of the young pups was still constantly reminding him, “Be careful, be very careful…”
The vet mumbled, irritated, under his breath, asking her to shut up. He picked up the forceps specifically used for fixing the shape and clipped them onto the ears of the puppy tightly, fixing their shape and stopping the blood at the same time.
After making sure that there was nothing wrong, he picked up the sharp scalpel, making two clean cuts down the sides, and parts of the ears plopped down onto the plastic cover. The fresh cuts started to ooze with blood, but not too much, due to the forceps clamping down on the blood vessels.
While waiting for the blood to stop naturally, the vet did not just wait there. He swiftly went on to crop the ear of the next puppy, sedating, shaving, measuring, fixing its ear. By the time the preparations were done, the first puppy had already stopped bleeding.
He took off the forceps, satisfied with the results after a brief check. The two ears were of about the same length, so he picked up thumb forceps and sutures to start suturing up the cut.
He was clearly experienced, and he had done god knew how many of these surgeries on dogs on this table. Due to the fact that his fees were lower, he might have been even more experienced than Sun Xiaomeng. The entire process from the start to finish didn’t even take ten minutes.
The few puppies were lined up on the table, and the vet seemed to be working in a factory line, mechanically and accurately completing the ear docking process. The number of ears in the stainless steel kidney dish grew as time passed.
None of the dogs bled a lot, so the process wasn’t as bloody as people expected it to be. He even had the time to joke, “Do you want the ears that we cut off? You might be able to get a whole plate of stir-fried dog ears from these…”
The woman waved her hands in disgust. “I rear dogs—how can I eat dog ears? It just disgusts me. I don’t want it.”
“Alright, that’s up to you. Someone else will want it, anyway.”
The vet hummed a tune, but his expression suddenly changed, and he bent down to put his face near a young pup’s muzzle. This young pup was the last one, and even before the surgery had started, the vet had found something off with its breathing.
“F*ck!” he swore, putting everything else down. He whipped out another needle, drawing out a set amount of a drug, and quickly injected it into the last puppy.
“What is it?” the woman asked nervously.
The vet had no time to chat with her, so it was Zhang Zian who answered on his behalf. “Maybe the last puppy was weaker, and the sedative was too much for it. He’s injecting the reversing agent now to get it to wake up.”
“You monk! If you kill my dog, you’ll have to compensate me!” The woman immediately stiffened, commanding him.
The vet huffed, “Rubbish! I told you that you have to bear the risks! Stop spouting nonsense! This dog’s not dead yet, so don’t delay me from giving it treatment. Keep yammering and it really will die!”
The woman wanted to scold him more, but considering the dog and the truth in the vet’s words, she decided to swallow all of her words first and hash it out with him if the puppy really died.
She calculated in her heart, and felt the pain intimately. It was just around 300 dollars to do ear cropping at a proper clinic, but with five dogs to crop, it would cost her 1500. But this bald veterinarian only charged 100 dollars per dog, and she had only let him do it because she was stingy. If one of them really died, she would be losing a lot of money.
By the time the vet had administered all of the reversing agents, he went on to compress the puppy’s chest and do CPR, little beads of sweat dotting his forehead from the effort.
Blackie hugged his puppy close to his chest, thanking the stars for the fact that he hadn’t let them crop its ears. He would’ve deeply regretted it if anything happened.
Seeing its siblings lying on the table, the puppy seemed to feel for them too, whining constantly.
Snowy didn’t dare look, but she knew that something was up, asking if the dog was alive with her eyes covered.
Zhang Zian observed by the side, noticing that the pup had pulled its tongue back into its mouth. Seeing that the bald vet didn’t have any more hands to spare, he whipped out a pair of disposable gloves that he brought around with him and donned them. He pressed his hands onto the puppy’s head then, opening its mouth and pulling its tongue out, preventing its contracting tongue from blocking the airway.
The vet gave him a smile out of gratitude.
Many surgeries were unable to be completed alone, even with the most experienced of vets. If an emergency happened, it would be difficult for one person to handle the situation.
Sun Xiaomeng was a proper graduate from a proper vet school. She was extremely experienced and had a ton of knowledge. The vet clinic had proper equipment present, too, but she still needed a vet nurse to assist her in surgery.
But the vet here had a stall to earn some cash, and if he hired someone else to help, then it wouldn’t be worth it anymore. He could only take the risk.
Thank goodness the puppy was a hardy one. After the reversing agent started to work, its eyes flitted about as it woke up, albeit weakly.
Everyone on site heaved a sigh of relief.
Snowy finally asked to leave with her heart thumping in fear, since she didn’t want to stay.
Zhang Zian wanted to call Vladimir so they could leave together, but he realized that he had gone missing.
