Going to try my first dissection, any tips?
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maz
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- Posts: 351
- Joined: 15 Aug 2011, 21:51
- Location: highett vic
Went out to feed the birds today and found mumma quail dead (was a bit weird she was sitting in her normal favourite sunning position and looked normal till I reached out and she didn't move) so I thought I should open her up and have a look see if I can work out what went wrong. I haven't done a bird dissection since the pigeon in second year uni (so 20+ years ago lol) and she's the first bird death I've had in years so first real opportunity. So what are the main places and things I should be looking at?
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Niki_K
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- Posts: 428
- Joined: 23 Oct 2011, 12:18
- Location: Melbourne, VIC
It's better to use scissors than a scalpel 
Look for discolouration in the organs (as well as lumps, possible creamy-white fungal infections etc), though this may be difficult if the quail has been dead for a while, as they start to go squishy and yuck pretty quickly. Don't hold out too much hope for finding the problem, though, it can be really tough. One of mine had a brain haemmorhage, which was pretty cool to see when I opened him up (in a morbid way). I'll leave further tips for the professionals!
Look for discolouration in the organs (as well as lumps, possible creamy-white fungal infections etc), though this may be difficult if the quail has been dead for a while, as they start to go squishy and yuck pretty quickly. Don't hold out too much hope for finding the problem, though, it can be really tough. One of mine had a brain haemmorhage, which was pretty cool to see when I opened him up (in a morbid way). I'll leave further tips for the professionals!