1043 Surgical Accidents (1/2)

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.

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.