Spiders, Snakes, and Other Critters (Monday 8/28/2023)
We are in the tropics and with that comes some interesting critters. One of the first unusual (thankfully!) encounters was a snake in one of the volunteers’ bed. Julie, the volunteer, was sufficiently freaked out that she never returned to that room, as if the room alone was to blame. Sanne removed the snake with a long-handled strainer and took it outside. The snake was small, but apparently venomous, as we found out later when Al and I saw the security guards at the gate killing a similar snake with a machete.
There are plenty of spiders around, but not unusually scary ones. However, lately, there have been a few encounters with tarantulas. These are not the super large ones that you see on TV or in the zoo, but more palm-sized. I don’t think they are poisonous, but have yet to look it up. We have found a few on the walls of the volunteer home, San Vicente, and Allen removed one to the outside. They move fast! And started up Allen’s trouser leg while he was catching it. Another slightly larger one was killed by two of the volunteers who were hosting some of the kids. They saw it on the wall and threw a soccer ball at it until it was squished. Elke (the volunteer) showed me a video.
Frequent unwelcome visitors are the cock roaches (cucaracha in Spanish). They range from small, lady-bug size to huge and are good at skittering away. You can tell they are around by the tiny pepper-sized pellets that they leave. Luckily, they are not hard to kill but are very evasive!
One
of my least favorite things in Honduras is the tiny black flies that leave
mosquito-like welts on your skin. At first I thought it was mosquitos until I
smashed one on my skin and found blood. The bites are itchy, just like
mosquitos, but turn into little blisters in a few days as they heal. I wear a
lot of long pants and repellent, but still get bites. For a while, Al thought
maybe it was fleas from the many cats on the ranch and maybe that is part of
the problem, but the tiny black flies are definite contributors. Al and I
splurged ($100!) on a set of 3 rechargeable bug lights which we use at night to
attract and zap any insects in our room. They work pretty well, judging by the
amount of bugs we periodically clean out of them.
The
Volunteer House (San Vicente) inherited a cat from a previous volunteer. The
cat is named Matthias even though it is a girl and is rumored to be 15 years
old or more. Matthias is the only cat officially allowed to be fed by the
volunteers, but there are a number of other cats and kittens roaming the ranch,
many of which are living in our courtyard. The kittens are cute as they pounce
around the grounds, but most of us are annoyed by having to guard our food,
keep the kitchen door closed so they don’t get into the organic waste, and
having to listen to the constant begging as we eat. I opened our food drawer
one evening and was surprised as a small kitten jumped out! I am not sure how
it got in, but suspect the drawer above ours was open enough to allow a cat to
sneak in the back side. The cat must have been in the drawer all day as some of
the packages were torn open and there was cat poop and pee spread around. We
lost some of our stash that day which did not bother me as much as the nasty
smell.
Al told me that he found a scorpion in one of the concrete boxes that he and the maintenance crew had to work in for a septic problem. Two of the kids said that they saw an armadillo near the school one day. We hear coyotes occasionally and often see other animals.
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