5 Animal Deaths Renew Criticism of Care at Zoo

The zoo's veterinarians said Deem concentrated on the lemur's breathing problem but also applied a pressure bandage to the leg. A pathology report said the animal, already weakened by its respiratory condition, died that morning of shock caused by the leg hemorrhage. It was 4 years old.

The Orangutan

Indah, a star attraction at the zoo's Think Tank, developed an abscess near her rectum in November 2002. The zoo's veterinarians treated it with antibiotics and warm compresses, but the abscess infection did not heal.

Nearly a year later, according to medical records, the abscess was an open wound the size of a half dollar. An outside surgeon examined the abscess Nov. 25, 2003, during a sterilization procedure and found that it did not appear very extensive. There was no sign of a fistula, or draining tract, carrying infection to other organs.

On March 9, 2004, the records state, the abscess was "still exuding thick yellow [pus] material." That month, the veterinarians discontinued antibiotic treatment, saying it did not seem to be working.

By then, a zoo biologist who did language research with Indah and another orangutan, Azy, had moved to the Great Ape Trust of Iowa. The zoo agreed to lend him the pair so the studies could continue.

During a pre-shipment exam Sept. 7, 2004, Sanchez noted that the "fistula/abscess" was draining "mild amounts" of pus but was "not very extensive or deep." When he squeezed it, the anesthetized animal moved. "Appears painful," he wrote in his notes.

On Sept. 28, Indah was shipped to the primate center in Des Moines. On Nov. 11, veterinarians in Iowa found a tiny hole in the bladder, through which urine was seeping into surrounding tissue. The animal was euthanized immediately.

The pathology report said that the abscess and bladder infections had existed for some time and that it was possible the abscess spread infection to the bladder.

Nichols said he would "stake my reputation" that the abscess caused the deadly bladder problem. He, Kuehn and Larson said the abscess should have been surgically explored and removed before the zoo shipped Indah to Iowa.

Ramsay said he would have been "more aggressive" with the abscess, squirting dye into the draining tract to see, in X-rays, how far it went.

Even superficial abscesses "can be lethal," Kuehn said. Yet the zoo, he said, seemed to regard the abscess as "a nuisance," leaving Indah "with a painful, chronic, dangerous problem."

The zoo's veterinarians said they took the 24-year-old animal's case very seriously and determined through several probes that the abscess and fistula were not deep. Indah, they said, was not in any discomfort. They said the abscess did not require surgery, which might have caused permanent injury or, if the animal picked at the sutures, worsened the infection.

"We would never ship an animal with a life-threatening condition," Murray said. She added, "We had no indication that there was any problem."

The Komodo Dragon

Kraken was one of more than a dozen Komodo dragons hatched at the zoo in 1992. The births made history as the first group of this endangered species born outside Indonesia.

Trooper Walsh, who was a biologist at the zoo's Department of Herpetology, helped pioneer the breeding and management of the huge lizards. He said he worked with the zoo's veterinarians to do physicals on Kraken at least every six months, with internal ultrasound exams, given under anesthesia, that probed the reptile's reproductive system. The female, which weighed nearly 80 pounds, was prone to reproductive tract infections, which have killed 18 captive Komodo dragons worldwide.

Kraken was last given an internal ultrasound exam in April 2001. Walsh said the exams lapsed after he left the zoo in 2000. He said Reptile House curator Mike Davenport unfairly forced him out on disability retirement. Davenport declined to be interviewed.

The zoo later began doing external ultrasounds while the animal was awake but confined to a box. Walsh said the external exam does not provide the same detail.

Nichols said the lizard did not have any type of ultrasound for the last 23 months of its life and that the zoo's staff "should have paid extra attention to this animal."

Late last year, Kraken became lethargic and had a distended abdomen, according to medical records. Sanchez wrote on Dec. 22 that Davenport was not concerned because the animal had shown similar behavior during previous breeding seasons. The 12-year-old lizard was found dead three days later after an egg follicle and a blood vessel ruptured in an ovary, causing severe blood loss.

The zoo's veterinarians said an ultrasound exam would not have prevented the death.

"I firmly disagree," said Walsh, a member of the Species Survival Program for Komodo dragons, who described himself as "heartsick" over Kraken's death. "It could have helped save this animal . . . and would have been the best way to detect the problem."

Staff researcher Bobbye Pratt contributed to this report.