...from “I’ve Got To Write a Book!”
by Ira Wiggins
Panama (part 3)
Panama had a variety of interesting insects, many of quite gigantic proportions. Termite nests were common, not the mounds of dirt on the ground as in Africa but rather huge dark balls on the trunk or in the limbs Or trees. These were hand, brittle structures teeming inside with termites which would come pouring out if a machete opened a hole in the side. The rain never made these nests soft. The termites ate any dead wood in the tree and were able to digest the cellulose by being fortuitously provided with a special enzyme in the stomach for the purpose.
Butterflies were multi-hued and spectacular, the morpho (royal blue) being perhaps the best known and most sought after. These latter are dull brown on the underside but are bright, iridescent sky-blue on the tops of the wings. When one flies in the sunlight it appears as though a blue light is flashing on and off as it weaves erratically through the trees. It is astonishing to see one land near by then “disappear” on a limb as it is concealed by its near-perfect camoflauge. An interesting fact is that there is absolutely no blue pigment in the wing. The color is due to light refracted from the layer of microscopic scales which entirely covers the upper wing surface. If a finger is passed firmly over the surface a specimen of the “blue” can be collected; if the fingers are then rubbed together to mix up the scales, all that results is a dull gray mass.
I put many specimens of insects in plastic, but if the royal blue is thus treated the wing surface turns black because the liquid plastic gets between the tiny scales and disturbs the refraction. I tried many ways to overcome this frustrating situation; even applying 10 layers of hair-spray did not work. The only thing that came close was putting the butterfly in a thin plastic bag, withdrawing the air and enclosing bag and all in the liquid plastic.
Tarantulas and scorpions which I caught or which were given to ne all ended up in plastic. The Panama scorpion, in contrast to certain of those in the western U.S., is not deadly but its sting can be excruciatingly painful, as I found when one objected to my handling of it prior to injection with formaldehyde. It was one of the rare times I have ever had to take a narcotic for pain. When the pain ceased the finger tip remained numb for two days, so that I was unable to use that finger for fine tasks, such as buttoning my shirt. Such a reaction is typical of scorpion stings.
The rhinoceros beetle derives its name from a large, horn-like projection on its nose. It has been described as “fist-sized” by some but I have never seen one that large. They cannot bite but have sharp claws at the ends of the legs which can draw blood if the beetle is forcibly pulled from the bare skin. They are easily removed (if you were so adventuresome as to allow one to crawl on you in the first place - for a picture, of course) by tapping them gently on the rear to induce them to crawl off. These giant beetles are harmful only to the coconut tree. They live in the ground at the base of the tree and suck juices from the roots. The rhinoceros beetle makes a spectacular specimen when mounted in plastic.
The coconut beetle is five to six inches long (not including the very long antennae), oblong in shape and nut-brown in color. The large pinchers on the front are impressive and are used to chew through the hull of a coconut to get at the meat on which the beetle feeds. They are also capable of inflicting a painful wound with the pinchers. Both the rhinoceros and the coconut beetle are reluctant to fly but are very capable of flight and, as you can imagine, appear like small birds on the wing.
The red-wing grasshopper is of similar size but flies readily, exposing its spectacular red under-wings in the process. When the wings are spread out, as in a specimen, it looks like a cross between a butterfly and a grasshopper.
An abandoned humming-bird nest made a charming specimen in plastic.
*****
As I entered the living room of our apartment upon returning home from a day at the clinic, Betty, pointing, said, “I’ll give you 30 guesses as to what I have in that cardboard box.”
“A butterfly?” No. “A snake?” No. “Thirty thousand dollars?” No. “An elephant?” Don’t be silly. “Winston Churchill?” No.
“I could give you a million guesses and you couldn’t get it.”
“0.K. I give up. What is it?”
“A live humming-bird! But guess how I got it.”
I thought I had a pretty good idea. “It flew against the window and knocked itself out.” This was a common occurrence with other birds.
“Nope. I just reached out and picked it off the perch of our hummingbird feeder!”
“Aw, c’mon, you must be drunk.” Kidding.
“I knew you wouldn’t believe me. That’s why I put it in a box and saved it to show you.”
In starting to refill the feeder, Betty had noted that the bird was reluctant to fly from its perch. When she lifted the feeder from its suspending wire the bird still remained on the perch so she plucked it off and put it in the box. Perhaps it had eaten some fermented nectar or fermented sugar water from a feeder or perhaps it was suffering from hypoglycemia (low blood sugar) to which hummers are subject. In any event, by that time the bird was vigorously protesting its imprisonment so I released it.
On another occasion when a hummer was on the feeder perch I slowly opened the window adjacent to it and the bird did not move.
“Look, Betty, I’m going to slowly move my hand toward him and see how close I can get before he flies.”
Two feet. One foot. One inch! I was finally able to stroke him twice gently on the tail before he flew.
*****
Panama has five types of venomous snakes: coral, eye-lash viper, bushmaster, fer-de-lance and hog-nose viper (in contrast to the non-venomous hog-nose snake of the U.S.). The tropical rattle-snake is present throughout Central America, but, for some unknown reason, has never been found in Panama. I set as my goal putting small specimens of all five types in plastic but was never able to obtain suitable specimens of the bushmaster (a nocturnal snake) or of the hog-nose viper. Specimens of the fer-de-lance (live) and the eye-lash viper (frozen) were given to me by a local veterinarian.
I found a tiny coral snake at the local golf course but it was too small.
One evening I had a phone call from the front desk of the hospital. “Mr. Wiggins, we have a snake in a glass jug here for you and I’d really appreciate it if you would get it right away. A ‘’campesino” has his wife in the hospital here and heard that some crazy “gringo” doctor was looking for a live coral snake, so he brought it in. Please get it out of here.”
“It’s alive?”
“It sure is. How soon can you come?!’
The specimen was almost two feet long, which is large as coral snakes go. It was in a clear, one-gallon glass jug with a small neck, which posed an interesting problem as to how to inject it with formaldehyde without it first injecting me with venom. Solution: Poke a hole in the metal cap; spray in an anesthetic (ethyl chloride); shake the anesthetized snake out and quickly inject it with formaldehyde, meanwhile wearing heavy leather gloves just in case. The formaldehyde quickly kills the snake and is also an excellent preservative. The coral has tiny, immovable fangs midway back on the upper jaw. Its mouth is tiny but can be opened to a flat 180 degrees so it can actual1y strike on a flat surface and inject venom. It does not have to grasp a small fold of skin and chew its venom in as was previously believed.
*****
Carl and Martha Peterson and Betty and I were driving slowly home on a gravel road from the beach when we saw a long, slender, yellow snake crossing the road. It appeared to be about three - three to three and a half feet long.
“Let’s see if we can catch it, Carl,” I cried as we skidded to a halt. I was interested in identifyIng it, not killing it.
By the time we got to the snake the front two thirds had disappeared into the grass and weeds along the road and the rest of the tail was rapidly going. I could not be sure but did not believe it was venomous so, on a rather foolish impulse and bravery bolstered by two beers, I grabbed the tail and rapidly backed up, dragging the snake from its concealment. Carl was standing back and watching the performance. Assuming that any self-respecting snake would turn and strike the moment it was free of the weeds I immediately started swinging it in an arc around my head; the centrifugal force prevented the hapless creature from turning on me.
“What are you gonna do now, Ira?”
“I dunno, Carl. Have any suggestions?”
“Can’t think of any. No point in killing it.” It would have been easy to slam it down onto the gravel.
“Guess I’ll have to let it go. Can’t do this all day.” With that I aimed it at the weeds and let it fly as gently as possible to its freedom. I imagined I could hear the creature say as it raced confusedly away, “Damn! Now what was that all about?”
*****
Tom, our high-school age son, and I were driving our VW bug on an abandoned road near Coco Solo at sundown when we spied a large boa constrictor, lying motionless to soak up the heat, in the middle of the road. It was equal to my upper arm in width and about six feet long, a beautiful specimen. I jumped out of the car, instructing Tom to take the car home and bring something to catch him with while I tried to keep him in the road. About that time the snake began to move slowly off the road and my efforts at steering him back onto the road were useless. Calling Tom back I picked up a broken stout branch from the ground and pressed it firmly behind the snake’s head. It broke loose and struck with open mouth at the branch, but I felt that if I pressed harder the next time I could stop him long enough to get a firm hold behind the head with my hand. It worked. His struggles were purposeful but not violent and not of such strength as I had imagined from Tarzan movies. I had thought that, with Tom along as back-up, the worst that could happen would be to get a bite the equivalent of that of a rat terrier or such. I supposed that his strength might allow him to work his head free from my grasp, in which case Tom and I could alternate taking holds of his neck, but that was not necessary. I allowed him to coil around my arm from fist to shoulder. The constricting action made the veins stand out on the back of my hand with some resultant discomfort but no real pain. Had it been too uncomfortable Tom could easily have grasped the tail and unwrapped the reptile. It was a healthy creature with faintly iridescent colors.We took it home, took some pictures then gave it to Luke Palumbo Sr., the biology teacher at the local high-school. He fed it on with rats and baby chicks and within two weeks any student could gently remove it from the cage and handle it without fear of being bitten. The boa, like the garter snake, tends to have a placid disposition.
*****
Another “boa story” could well have had a tragic ending. Returning back to camp after being all day on jungle survival training the soldier saw a large boa constrictor and decided to take it back with him to show his friends. He captured it rather easily and put it in a large sack but, in the process, sustained a superficial bite at the base of one thumb. It was more of a scratch than a puncture would. Not yet having a cage for it, he turned it loose in a small room which he had been using as a work-shop.
“Hey, Mike! Come see the nice boa I captured,” he said to a buddy.
As the buddy looked his eyes widened. “Nice snake, Bill. - but that’s not a boa; it’s a bushmaster. Do you know what a bite from that could do to you?”
“Holy shit!! It did bite me, - but only a scratch. I’m sure it didn’t inject any venom. If the colonel found out he’d break my ass!”
The colonel did find out and ordered him to behead the snake at once and to report with it to the hospital emergency room, - which he did. The rest of the story is anti-climax. He was kept overnight for observation but developed no symptoms and was discharged to duty the following morning. The fist-sized head with its coarse, rough scales was kept for some time in the emergency room as an object lesson. I can only presume that the colonel thereafter put more emphasis on the course in snake identification.
*****
The sloth is a fairly common creature in Panama, most often seen hanging from or feeding on a cecropia tree. Occasionally they are seen on the jungle floor or crawling slowly along the road. The coat is usually blotched with a growth of greenish algae and occupied by various vermin, including a type of moth which is called, appropriately enough, the “sloth moth”. If we saw a sloth crossing a road in its dream-like, slow-motion fashion we would often stop to expedite that particularly perilous portion of its journey. Nevertheless, road kill was rather common.
*****
One night, as I drove to the hospital for duty on the midnight shift, the gleam of my headlights revealed a huge jet-black dog with a long, graceful black tail lope smoothly out of the jungle on one side of the road, cross the road and enter the jungle on the opposite side. It had a definite cat- like grace about it. It was only after it had passed and disappeared that the adrenaline surged into my system as I realized that I had seen the black leopard which was rumored to have the jungle adjacent to the hospital as part of its territory. Had I been speeding I might well have struck and killed or maimed the beautiful creature.
A few weeks later, one of the negro hospital ward attendants on a nocturnal coffee-break walked out into the darkness behind the hospital to stretch his legs. Sometimes night hospital duty can be boring. As he rounded a corner he came face to face with what was probably the same black leopard. He turned and ran for the safety of the hospital; simultaneously the cat turned and ran for the safety of the jungle. There the similarity ended. I seriously doubt that the black leopard turned as pale as did that black man as he entered the back door of the hospital.
*****
The giant anteater is very rare in Panama. However, I had seen several specimens of the lesser (or collared) anteater killed on the road. On two occasions I have seen them in the wild. These long-snouted animals with the bowed front legs, strong claws and large prehensile tail weigh eight to 12 pounds and are incapable of biting, but with its claws can easily tear apart the strongest termite nest to lick up the tasty occupants with its long, sticky tongue. The claws also make very effective defensive weapons.
About 9:30 one evening I was jogging along a dimly lighted street of Coco Solo and saw a large cat ambling across the road. My first thought was, “That’s a funny gait for a cat.”
As I approached closer it dawned on me, “Holy cow! It’s an anteater. Wonder if I could catch it to take home and get a picture.” I found that I could “herd” it by stepping in front of it any time it started to move off in a particular direction. If I approached it rapidly it would face me, sit back on its prehensile tail like a boxing kangaroo and take swipes at me with its front claws. Thinking I could tire it out by these “boxing” efforts I looked about in vain for a stick or branch of any kind with which to worry it. No luck. The Panama Canal Company was a bug on cleanliness and neatness of its streets.
I parried with my tennis-shoe clad foot but it had good reflexes. Once it dodged backward and fell over. On the next swipe I was alarmed when it caught one claw in the lowermost loop of my shoe-lace. I had sudden visions of the beast climbing up my leg and lacerating it to ribbons. In an attempt to keep it as far away from me as possible, I immediately started turning rapidly as I jumped up and down on the unhampered foot while swinging the other in a wide circle. The centrifugal force kept the animal at a distance, three legs and the tail groping in the air. After about three turns (I was thankful it wasn’t necessary to see how long I could keep that silly maneuver up) it sailed off into the air beside the road and scampered up the trunk of a palm tree, stoping about five feet up. If I grasped it by the tip of the tail and let it hang upside down would it be able to turn up and and tear at me With its front claws? Ready to quickly drop it, I gave the maneuver a try and it worked. The three and a half block trip home was a tedious one for I had to hold the six to seven pound animal at arm’s length to keep it from reaching my legs. I changed hands frequently and twice, when it almost reached my hand, I had to drop the animal and recapture it.
After taking a picture I watched as the frightened animal waddled rapidly off into the darkness.
*****
