Tuesday, December 15, 2009

Out-of-hospital water birth

4 comments:

  1. The first birth I ever saw was an orca delivering at Sea World in Orlando. They had another orca in with her as a midwife (seriously) and she would jump out of the water every now and then. I am assuming that was during transition!

    It was a breathtaking experience, and it was a total coincidence we were there that day.

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  2. Dou-la-la: I know, right??

    MomTFH: That is so interesting about the orca, and really cool that this was the first birth you saw!

    I actually learned after I posted it that this was a breech birth, which for whales means the baby came out head first, and that baby belugas generally "crown" ("rump"? "tail"?) for several HOURS to let the tail harden and prepare for swimming. Fascinating: http://www.babychums.com/2009/12/baby-beluga-whale-survives-rough-birth-at-chicago’s-shedd-aquarium/

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