Had an encounter with the Queen of the Jungle - Jimmy.
Jimmy is 15+ year old lioness at the Byculla zoo, Mumbai. She suffered an acute onset of paraplegia. She was stabilized by the team of vets at the zoo. She slowly regained her neurological deficits.
Had a look at her a couple of days later and she was still paraparetic with mild ataxia and marked weakness of the pelvic limbs. We were handed over the job to rehabilitate her. Since sedating her was not possible due to her age and condition. Had to manually put my hand in the cage and do some quick acupuncture.
Jimmy was not sedated but just restrained by a rope around her belly. Once I put my hand inside her cage, she did not quite like it initially, but once I started examining her ,she slowly relaxed as if she knew I am there to make her feel better and do her no harm. But had little time before she turns around. So instead of the routine Dry needle acupuncture , used Aqua-puncture .
She took that well too and she was on her way to recovery. A few weeks later , the zoo vets reported she was back to her usual self, walking and playing around with her favorite ball.
We are thankful to the team of Zoo vets for giving us a chance to help Jimmy recover.
