Unsticking the goop from a gluey flying-fox: this is Uhu

Uhu is an adult female Grey-Headed Flying-Fox who was noticed hanging on the flying fox in a children's playground by a former bat rescuer. He said she had a broken leg which was hanging wrongly and tucked up against her abdomen.
When I got there and quickly netted her down, she had one foot "glued" to her abdomen and part of her wing glued to her abdomen as well.
We don't know what the sticky goop is - it had no chemical smell and no tree sap smell, but it was very sticky and viscous. It looked like she'd been in mud at first, then it looked like it was her pooing out sticky poo.
I called her Uhu which is a kind of glue we can buy in Australia.

Of course, I decided this was a job for The Princess, who wasn't all that far away, and brought her another sticky (sic) little batty issue to sort out.
We still don't know what the icky stuff was, but we spent over an hour picking the dry bits off, oiling the viscous goop tarring her abdomen and fur and massaging it in, then anointing her with milk powder to bind with the oil which was binding with the goop. Then using conditioner lotion to bind with it all and help remove all the stick.

She was very quiet and cooperative (ie, she was really sick) and we had to balance out the stress levels of doing this without an anaesthetic against her unfitness for an anaesthetic, and against the stress of spending an hour handing and manipulating her, and her getting cold and shocked from being essentially wet.
The issue with the unknown gluey goop on her wings was that the membrane would get rapidly inflamed and break down. Getting it off quickly without any solvent was a critical step for her survival; there wasn't much point leaving the goop on her till she was in a better physical state if her wings just dissolved, rendering her unreleasable.

We did a pretty good job, getting most of the stick off and getting her stabilised.
The Princess put an IV in for her when I was leaving, to increase her blood volume and blood pressure and reduce shock.

Surprisingly she lasted the night, though she wasn't great. Overnight she started pooing out more sticky tacky goop... She died later on day 2, about 30 hours after rescue.

RIP Uhu. I wish I knew what you had eaten to cause this.

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