'Loop Group' tells their animal tales

They call themselves "The Loop Group," because they all have or have had veterinary clinics in Mobile's Loop area.

They have been meeting regularly for lunch for more than 40 years.

Five veterinarians who have a total of 242 years' experience were at the group's most recent meeting. Two, Dr. David Gross and Dr. David Sidel, are still practicing. Dr. Stuart Dowling, Dr. Lawrence Cottle and Dr. Gaylord Willard are retired.

You can imagine that in all those years, there have been some unique moments.

"Somebody brought a bear to my office," Cottle said. The animal was hav ing seizures, so "I tranquilized, just like I would have done to a big dog."

Dowling treated a tiger that had been brought to his office – dying because it had been fed a meat-only diet.

Dowling told the owner that in the wild, tigers also eat what their prey has eaten and that is a necessary part of their nutrition.

He couldn't save the animal, but the incident "saved a lot of big cats' lives," Dowling explained, "because the word got out to feed them more than just meat."

Like Cottle's bear, the tiger was part of the traveling petting zoos that toured the South a few decades ago.

Sidel was confronted with a pet snake "that seemed pretty mean, and it had a big abscess on its back. I just put him in the refrigerator and he hibernated," Sidel said, adding that he then removed the snake and safely treated the sore.

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