Finally, the giraffe began to show signs of improvement.
“We were all laughing, and crying,’’ Baitchman said. “We were ecstatic about seeing him urinate.’’
But Beau is not out of the woods yet. If he develops another obstruction, the zoo’s only choice will be surgery. And if he undergoes surgery, the prognosis is not good: Fourteen male giraffes in the United States have had the same procedure, and all of them died during the operation.
“The anesthesia itself is extremely high-risk’’ because of the animals’ extremely long necks, said John Linehan, chief executive of Zoo New England. “That’s a very complicated factor, in terms of air flowing into the lungs and the distance between the nose and mouth and the lungs and getting blood up there to the brain.’’
Still, the staff is holding out hope the giraffe will pull through.
Beau has done it before.
In 2004, he became one of the zoo’s most famous residents after surviving wasting syndrome, a common and incurable metabolic disorder among giraffes. He is the first known Masai giraffe to have survived with the condition. If he recovers, Beau could have several years ahead of him. Masai giraffes have a natural life span of 18 to 21 years, said Linehan.
At one point, Beau was 600 pounds underweight. But he bounced back and with the help of a new special diet he had three calves with his mate of 10 years, Jana, the only other giraffe at the zoo.
“He’s a guy that everybody in the zoo has such an emotional bond with,’’ Linehan said. “We all have some special attachment to Beau.’’
Perhaps no one has more of an attachment than Autumn Faucher of Pelham, N.H.
In 2004, the then-9-year-old girl made headlines after she raised thousands of dollars to help defray the cost of Beau’s medical care and expensive new diet.
