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Jerry Haigh shares his adventures as a wildlife veterinarian with the University of Saskatchewan, whether in a clinic at the base of spectacular Mount Kenya in Africa or on the Canadian prairies. Haigh has healed wild animals such as moose, polar bears and even a toothless old lion. George, the resident lion of the Forestry Farm Zoo, had a tooth infection and needed a couple of stainless steel crowns, which was accomplished by Jerry and his team of four dentists. Jerry's study of the best cocktail of drugs for immobilizing various species has brought him in touch with researchers of black, grizzly, and polar bears, bison, moose and many others.
"Where Men Walk with Moose", an episode of Wild Kingdom, followed Jerry along with a team of moose researchers from the Department of Natural Resources. When the director of the Calgary Zoo needed dentistry for Foggy the Hippo, he turned to Jerry with his skill at immobilizing a wide variety of species and his ingenuity with a Gigli saw. Jerry and his family were called upon to save a black bear cub orphaned by an earthmover, using bottle feeding and other ingenious methods. At the invitation of Ray Schweinsburg, biologist for Canada's Northwest Territories, Haigh spent time at Pond Inlet (now Qikiqtaaluk) on the eastern shore of Baffin Island and used his specialized techniques for animal immobilization and collecting samples for research on the polar bear, the icon of Canada's wildlife. Porcupines to Polar Bears is filled with more heart-warming and exciting stories from a time when being a wildlife veterinarian was a rare occupation.
Jerry Haigh is a wild animal veterinarian originally from Scotland. He went to Kenya as a young vet and had adventures all over Africa, adventures he retold in his previous books, Wrestling with Rhinos: The Adventures of a Glasgow Vet in Kenya, The Trouble with Lions: A Glasgow Vet in Africa and Of Moose and Men: A Wildlife Vet's Pursuit of the World's Largest Deer. After Africa, Haig ended up coming to Canada, specifically Saskatchewan, where he continued to work with wild animals from porcupines to polar bears. In retirement he has become a popular public speaker, using his veterinary experiences to engage audiences all over western Canada.
