Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, August 24, 1995 TAG: 9508240013
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 6 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: KEVIN KITTREDGE STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
He has given shots to hummingbirds.
He has given shots to rattlesnakes.
Carefully.
"That becomes a little more worrisome," the veterinarian said of the snakes.
Marx specializes in exotic animals. This includes, generally, any animal not immediately associated with either the barnyard or the supper bowl. Ostriches and emus. Pheasants, peacocks, cougars, bears, bison.
"Veterinary medicine started out as taking care of cattle, mostly, and horses," Marx explained. "Sheep and goats. As people got more and more urban, it spread to dogs and cats."
Exotics came last - as veterinarians, like physicians, began to specialize.
Some veterinarians will still treat any animal. Big or little - slithery, furry, fanged or feathered.
But increasingly, specialization is the rule, said Marx and Vanessa Rolfe, a Salem veterinarian whose practice also focuses on exotic animals.
"More and more of the [veterinary] schools are allowing students to specialize in exotics," Marx said.
To some degree, it is misleading to say that anyone specializes in exotics. The range of creatures included beneath the tag is so broad that veterinarians, no matter how well-trained, often confront the unknown.
"You can't be a specialist at the detailed level of knowledge you might have with a cow, for instance," Marx said. "I have to be able to care for a bison, for an exotic cat, for an ostrich, for a hermit crab. ... We're always experimenting. There are no approved procedures. ... Every time I walk into a house, I tell people, `This is an experimental drug.'''
Marx sometimes uses drugs for humans on the animals. Drugs also are made for horses, dogs, cats and poultry.
Whatever is used, creative thinking is required. Marx might, for example, take a tablet intended for a horse and cut it into 42 tiny pieces - to give one of the pieces to a snake.
He has put casts on iguanas, done surgery on rats.
One should not assume that the owners of such animals care less about them than another pet owner might about his or her dog or cat, Marx said.
"I have people who cry just as hard over a goldfish as you would over your pet dog," Marx said. "I had somebody spend $140 for a chicken that was sick. Because it was important in their lives."
Exotic animals are the fastest-growing segment of the pet market, Marx said. "I suppose the hottest pets right now are hedgehogs, ferrets, iguanas and small snakes - usually ball pythons. The reptile [population] isn't large - but it has become significant.
"I think it points out how important animals are in people's lives," Marx said of the popularity of exotics. "I have a theory about society as a whole - we've just become too overcrowded. There's this element of human life that wants to have nature around us. If we have an animal, we can have a little bit of nature around us."
Marx grew up on a farm in North Dakota, then spent 20 years in the Navy. He attended the Virginia-Maryland Regional College of Veterinary Medicine after his retirement - then went into business for himself because, he said, he wanted to be his own boss.
He makes house calls only. It is critical, Marx said, that he see an animal's surroundings before treating it, since its living conditions are often its real problem.
His workdays vary widely. On the day he spoke to a reporter, Marx had been to an aviary and had cared for an emu injured in a fight.
"I really like the variety and the challenge," he said.
About those rattlesnakes ...
Marx said he takes no chances.
"First of all, you have to decide if you trust the owner to do the holding," Marx explained.
He has a rule he works by: "The veterinarian doesn't get bit."
Would he ever decline to treat an animal?
Marx thought it over.
"I never have," he said.
by CNB