APPLE VALLEY, Minn. — Behind the scenes at the Minnesota Zoo, animal caretakers were preparing a fancy seafood meal on Friday morning.
The coastal breakfast included squids, shrimp with their heads on and some mussels. It "otter" be of the best quality.
"They eat a lot, we estimate they eat about 20 to 25 percent of their body weight every day," Marine Mammal Area supervisor Melanie Oerter said, referring to the three recipients of the seafood meal.
The lucky diners were no other than the three resident sea otters at the zoo.
"Their names are Capers, Jasper and Rocky," Oerter said. "Capers is 13, Jasper and Rocky are 12-years-old. They've really grown up as siblings so to speak."
Although the three aren't related, Oerter said they've basically spent their entire lives together. The three boys have also been the center of her universe for the last 13 years.
"The team that I've worked with has raised these sea otters since they were pups," she explained. "So when they have a hard time, so do we."
It's no surprise that it broke her heart when the team noticed that Rocky was struggling with an infection in one of his back flippers. The team noticed he wasn't using much of his back left flipper starting in June of last year. Suspecting a possible infection, the team said they treated Rocky with medication.
However, after initial improvements, Rocky's symptoms came back.
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"In October, we noticed his leg got really swollen," Oerter said. "We did further diagnostics and our veterinarian staff determined there was something going on with the bone inside his leg. That was likely not something that we would ultimately treat through medication."
The team determined that amputation was the only way to lift the burden from Rocky.
"It was a hard decision but we want to do what's best for our animals," Oerter said. "Rocky lives in the water and so you can see how agile he is swimming even without that flipper. Since we could remove that painful limb and infection, our hope is that long-term, he will be a really happy, comfortable otter without that leg."
"As far as we know, this is the first flipper amputation performed on a sea otter [in human care]," Dr. Karisa Tang said. Tang is a resident veterinarian at the Minnesota Zoo. She along with six others operated on Rocky about two weeks ago.
"As a zoo veterinarian, a lot of things we do-- we say sometimes common procedures on uncommon species," Tang said. "We were a little nervous, everyone loves Rocky-- he's a beloved member of the MN Zoo family so while there were some nerves, once we were in the procedure we were very focused."
Two weeks after the surgery, everyone is loving what they're seeing. Rocky is back in the pool with his two friends Jasper and Capers. Oerter explained that Rocky really is back to being himself. He's displaying all of his normal behavior, including stealing food from his fellow otters.
"So far everything's going really well so hopes are very high, spirits are high," Tang said. "We're looking to make sure everything's going well."
"We really do hope that he's living his best life," Oerter added. "It's amazing how resilient animals are and we do want to share his story with our guests and inspire people to live their best lives too."
Starting today, folks at the MN Zoo have started giving Rocky the option to go into the public viewing area. They say we can expect to see Rocky more and more as he grows more comfortable with his physical change.