Originally posted by bajajudy
Mexico Mix
Mexico's 10 most surprising animals
Christine Delsol, Special to SF Gate
Wednesday, October 10, 2007
Everyone loves Mexico's sturdy burros and green iguanas, but when you explore beyond the tourist zones, you have a chance of seeing some truly amazing
animals you've probably never heard of. Here are some of the most surprising Mexican birds and beasts you could hope to meet.
1) Eyelash viper (also nauyaca de pestañas, "eyelash pit-viper"): Don't be fooled by the name, or the pretty green body adorned with rust-colored
spots. This is a highly venomous, 3-foot pit viper, known for slithering through trees and vines in lowland forests and scooping up tree frogs,
lizards and mice for dinner. If you were to look one in the eye (which is inadvisable), you would see vertical pupils and several spiny scales jutting
out over each small eye, giving it "eyelashes" believed to serve as camouflage. The nocturnal snakes live in the low- and middle-elevation forests of
Chiapas and Tabasco states.
2) Jaguarundi (also leoncillo, "little lion"). This mid-sized (just over 2 feet, plus tail), spotless, reddish- or grayish-brown cat actually looks
more like a pint-sized puma than a jaguar. Its short legs, long, slender body and flattened head gives it a weasel- or otter-like silhouette.
Jaguarundis hunt near running water and are expert fishers; they favor undisturbed lowland forests and tall grass but also appears in dense tropical
vegetation. In fact, most of the country is jaguarundi habitat, except for Baja and a central strip of the northern desert, but their numbers are
dwindling. The Calakmul and Sian Ka'an biosphere reserves on the Yucatán Peninsula offer the best chance of an encounter.
3) Mexican caecilian (also called culebra de dos cabezas, or "two-headed snake"): Pity the poor caecilian. Though a perfectly respectable (if
primitive) amphibian, it looks like nothing so much as a 2-foot-long earthworm. With its limbless, gray or purplish body ringed by creases and a
slightly flattened triangular head barely distinguishable from its tail, it could easily star in a grade B horror flick. Like earthworms, caecilians
spend much of their lives underground, surfacing at night during rains. Unlike worms, they have tiny retractable tentacles and give birth to live
young. In the lowland rain forests of Veracruz, Oaxaca, Campeche, Chiapas and Tabasco states, you might find them lurking under logs, rocks or piles
of leaves. In populated areas, they hide in garbage piles.
4) Striped basilisk (also lagartija jesucristo, "Jesus Christ lizard"): Yellow racing stripes down the length of its brown body distinguish this
nimble lizard from its larger, more lethargic and far more famous cousin, the common green iguana. With a slimmer body and longer legs, the basilisk's
agility extends to running across the surface of water on its hind legs, earning it the biblical nickname. It grows to about 32 inches and lives along
streams and other bodies of water in Yucatán, Campeche, Quintana Roo, Oaxaca, Chiapas and Tabasco states.
5) Roseate spoonbill (also espátula rosada, "pink spatula"): If you've seen the Aflac commercial with the goat trying to pass itself off as a duck,
you'll be prepared for the roseate spoonbill — in this case it's a flamingo masquerading as a duck (or perhaps vice versa). Its legs and neck are
shorter than a flamingo's, and its 4.25-foot wingspan is slightly shorter. The mature spoonbill's body borrows the flamingo's shape and color, but the
neck and head are white and end at a comically elongated, spoon-shaped bill. Once hunted to decorate women's hats, the roseate spoonbill is now far
more widespread than the flamingo: It can be found wading in lowland marshes, ponds and lakes along the Gulf of Mexico coastline, along the Pacific
Coast from southern Sonora to Chiapas and on the east coast of Baja California Sur.
6) Pauraque (also tapacaminos picuyo, "road-blocker picuyo"): Next time you hear "goatsucker," banish thoughts of the hideous mythical Chupacabra and
dwell instead on the goatsucker order of birds, whose closest relatives are owls. Of the goatsucker order, the pauraque, about 11 inches long, is one
of the loveliest: tweedy brown feathers brightened by black spots and streaks, long tail a riot of white and black stripes and brown and black bars.
White bands on their wings flash during flight. Pauraques are nocturnal, resting on the ground during the day in shady spots, in grasslands, pastures,
woodlands and cultivated areas throughout southern and central Mexico as far north as Sinaloa.
7) Paca (also tepezcuintle and tuza real, "royal tuza"): Though dainty compared with South America's capybara (the world's largest rodent), the
2.5-foot-long paca is Mexico's rodent king. It burrows in rain forests, mangrove swamps, drier areas close to water and even in tree thickets in
public parks, ranging as far north as San Luis Potosí and throughout southern Mexico. With its squirrel-like head, delicate feet and brown fur
speckled with white spots much like a fawn's coat, it's an endearing creature — but its fondness for yam, cassava, sugar cane, corn and other food
crops bedevils Mexico's farmers.
8) Violaceous trogon (also trogón violáceo): The smaller (about 9.5 inches) cousin of the legendary quetzal, this bird has one advantage over its
much-celebrated kin: Its habitat is more widespread and its population larger, boosting the chances of spotting one. The trogon lacks the quetzal's
extravagant tail streamers but is showy in its own right, with a dark violet-blue head, greenish yellow eye ring, yellow breast, green back and black
and white barred tail. They live in deep-forest tree canopies but also frequent clearings, forest edges and tree plantations near streams and rivers
in tropical Oaxaca, Chiapas, Tabasco and throughout the Yucatán Peninsula.
9) Tayra (also cabeza de Viejo, "old man's head"): This cousin of the weasel and the otter looks like a product of Dr. Frankenstein's lab, with a
yellowish, dog-like head on a black or brown mink-like body. Reaching about 28 inches plus a luxurious tail, it shares the long, thin body, short
legs, long tail and soft, dense fur with its relatives. Unlike its kin, the tayra adapts well to populated areas and pops up in gardens and orchards
as well as its natural tropical and subtropical forest habitat. The omnivorous tree-climber can be spotted in daytime or at dusk in trees or on the
ground, where it nests in hollow trees, logs, burrows or tall grass. The tayra is found throughout the Yucatán and in Tabasco and Chiapas states.
10) Cacomistle (also mico rayado, "striped monkey"): A doe-eyed tree-dweller resembling our ring-tailed cat, this critter has family ties to the
exotic kinkajou and the common raccoon. Its pointy-nosed, vaguely cat-like head has a dark mask surrounding yellowish-white eye rings, creating a
saucer-eyed face that would be right at home in a Margaret Keane painting. A dark stripe runs down its tawny, densely furred body to a bushy, ringed
tail. The agile climber bounds through the middle and upper levels of trees by night and retires by day to hollow trees, caves, rock crevices or
abandoned buildings. They were hunted in the past but are fairly common today — though not often easy to see — in mountain and lowland forests as far
north as Guerrero, Puebla and Veracruz states and throughout southern Mexico.
For more information: "Travellers' Wildlife Guides: Southern Mexico" by Les Beletsky, a field guide with more than 100 color plates covering the
country's most wildlife-rich region, presents scientific detail in accessible text written with a touch of humor.
Most Web sites devoted to Mexico's animals stick to more commonly seen species. The fauna database in the online encyclopedia of the Mexican
conservation project Via Natura includes more unusual animals than most sites, plus many good photos. The educational site Mexicanfauna.com also has
detailed animal descriptions, some with photos. |