DULUTH, Minn. (AP) — An Alaska brown bear on the Lake Superior Zoo in northeastern Minnesota has a gleaming new silver-colored canine tooth in a first-of-its-kind process for a bear.
“That is the biggest crown ever created on this planet.” Dr. Grace Brown.
The 800-pound (360-kilogram) Tundra was put below sedation Monday and fitted with a brand new crown — the biggest dental crown ever created, in accordance with the zoo.
“He’s bought a bit of glint in his smile now,” zoo advertising supervisor Caroline Routley stated Wednesday.
The hour-long process was accomplished by Dr. Grace Brown, a board-certified veterinary dentist who helped carry out a root canal on the identical tooth two years in the past. When Tundra reinjured the tooth, the choice was made to present him a brand new, stronger crown. The titanium alloy crown, made by Creature Crowns of Submit Falls, Idaho, was created for Tundra from a wax caste of the tooth.
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Brown plans to publish a paper on the process within the Journal of Veterinary Dentistry later this 12 months.
“That is the biggest crown ever created on this planet,” she stated. “It needs to be revealed.”
Tundra and his sibling, Banks, have been on the Duluth zoo since they had been 3 months previous, after their mom was killed.
Tundra is now 6 years previous and, at his full peak on his hind legs, stands about 8 ft (2.4 meters) tall. The sheer measurement of the bear required a member of the zoo’s educated armed response workforce to be current within the room — a gun inside arm’s attain — in case the animal awoke in the course of the process, Routley stated. However the process went with no hitch, and Tundra is now again in his habitat, behaving and consuming usually.
Different veterinary groups haven’t all the time been as fortunate. In 2009, a zoo veterinarian at Henry Doorly Zoo and Aquarium in Omaha, Nebraska, suffered extreme accidents to his arm whereas performing a routine medical examination on a 200-pound (90 kilogram) Malaysian tiger.
The tiger was popping out of sedation when the vet inadvertently brushed its whiskers, inflicting the tiger to reflexively chew down on the vet’s forearm.