Other Photos of Non-Human Animals

These were pushed off the "Better Photos" page... but I hope you still find them worth perusing. If you see one that you think should replace something on the Better Photos page, I'd love to hear your thought!

This is an anaconda that drowned in the man's fishing net. Anacondas have been know to eat jaguars. Hmmm. Food for thought, though mention of the word "food" in this context doesn't help one's peace of mind. They aren't poisonous, anyway!

I saw a claim on a TV program that an anaconda can squeeze with a pressure of 90 psi. From we learn that "Adults of this species can grow to over 9 meters in length. For it's length, it is much heavier than other large constrictors, and so if weight and length are both considered, Green Anacondas are the largest snakes in the world." Do the arithmetic: Take a snake half that size, about 14 feet. Assuime that it has half its length wrapped around something. Assume (conservative!) that the width of the snake body, as it presses on victim, is 4". (Wish that you'd started all this in metric measures.) Total force applied: about 15 tons. A "piece" of lead, with a 1 square foot footprint, about 30 feet high presses down about this hard. Let's say the TV people exaggerated by a factor of 10. Get inside the coils of a medium sized anaconda and feel the squash of 3 feet (x 1 foot, x 1 foot) of lead. Hmm².

There's some more information for you on the University of Michigan's page^el, if you want to go there. (The courtship information is amusing.)

The University of Michigan site paints a more reasonable, if less exciting picture of the animal. There's no mention of killing jaguar. It also says.... {begin quotes}:

"The victim of an anaconda is seldom crushed, the snake only squeezes hard enough to prevent its victim from breathing."... and....

"Since it takes a long time to digest its food, an anaconda is often very docile after a meal and usually spends its time just lying in the sun along a river bank."... Ahhhh... sweet.... and....

"....will attack any vertebrate that they can catch and swallow, especially fish, amphibians, other snakes, and mammals such as capybara. Small individuals may climb trees to raid bird nests, and the largest specimens have been known to attack caimans, small deer, and peccaries. There are few records of attacks on humans, and no recorded deaths." (My emphasis.) {End of quotes}

A final thought on the "victims seldom crushed" observation. I wonder if, with a large meal, whether the snake may exceptionally take advantage of it's ability to crush to make chests, or shoulder or pelvic regions more gullet-friendly?

This lizard may never have been within 50 feet of the ground. It lives in the upper parts of the forest canopy, which we were able to access easily thank's to Explorama's walkway.

Seen in the canopy top, thanks to the stunning Explorama / ACTS canopy walkway. About 5cm, long dimension.

White winged swallow

Orphan baby giant ant eater... these are not just animals of the savannah.

Bushmaster, the "one step" snake. You get to take one step after you are bitten. Besides being poisonous, this and the fer-de-lance are said to be aggressive. Both are sources of work for the wonderful Amazon Medical Project, in addition to the important preventative care they dispense. US taxpayers can get a deduction for helping their important work.

Three toed sloth. These were fairly abundant... but it takes skilled and practiced eyes to find them, even when "in plain sight" like this one. We were very lucky in one of our boatmen, who could not only make his craft cross dry land (AND get us back to where we had started... no mean feat...), but also spotted perhaps most of the things we saw... certainly many of the most exciting things. (Thank you Jonny!!)

Sadly, not a very good photo, I fear, but the album would be incomplete without some image of the famous pink dolphins, living, along with the other sort, over 2000 miles from the ocean. This one is headed right, you can just make out his snout in front of his fore-head.

Hoatzin: a very "primitive" bird, in biological terms.. but it does have a unique (in birds) special adaptation: Due to its four stomachs, and resident bacteria, it can benefit from the energy in the cellulose of the plants it eats... in other words, it nutrition has a lot in common with cows.

Hoatzin again

Hoatzin... see previous

About an inch long

Monk-saki monkey

Red howler monkeys

Parrot on its nest.

This is a relative of the electric "eel". (Which isn't, by the way, an eel.) It too sends electricity into the water, though not as much. the water is very silty. The fish can feel the changes in the electric field caused by other things swimming by, and hence can find dinner. To simplify processing the information, it keeps it's body straight all the time, and swims by rippling a wave down the large ventral fin.

Fer De Lance, the "two step" snake. You get to take two steps after you are bitten, i.e. slightly less poisonous than the bushmaster, the "one-step" snake. Both are sources of work for the wonderful Amazon Medical Project, in addition to the important preventative care they dispense. US taxpayers can get a deduction for helping their important work.

Sorry... this page is just getting started.... I'll try to re-order the photos, add comments, get the file sizes right.... Later! More photos, first?

"Other (2nd quality photos) Local Humans" page.
"Other (2nd quality photos) Tourists" page.
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