Hiking in the Pines

[NJSnakeMan]

http://www.fieldherpers.com//view.php?site=fieldherpers&bn=fieldherpers_fieldherping&key=1124772524

I'll have more snake pictures up soon

-Brandon

 

[bobpbx]

Very cool shots. I never saw that salamander before. And I never saw a possum in daylight either. They disgust me somewhat. What is up with his ear?

 

[uuglypher]

Very cool shots. I never saw that salamander before. And I never saw a possum in daylight either. They disgust me somewhat. What is up with his ear?

The white foci / globules in the skin of the ears are schizonts (a stage of asexual reproduction) of a protozoon parasite known as Besnoitia darlingi. Some individual 'possums have the parasitic nodules only in the thin, lightly haired or hairless skin of the ears, lips, eyeids, and/or toe pads. In other infected 'possums they may be found as numerous white bead-like foci throughout the liver, myocardium (heart), spleen, and other parenchymatous (solid) visceral organs.
I've seen this parasitic infection to be common in 'possums in East Texas, Oklahoma, Missouri, Iowa, Ohio, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania, and rarely in the souther tier of counties in upstate New York, but so far have encountered none in South Dakota. Possibly a necessary intermediate host can't take the winter temperatures hereabouts? If you're of a mind to partake of 'possum for a meal, rest assured that the protozoon parasite cannot withstand being cooked to a level of well-done! I stopped eating 'possum on camping trips after I found one with a well-fed belly crawling out of the body cavity of a foul, maggot-ridden cow's carcass and covered in dripping, smeary putresence.

But if you can get past all that ... and can cook it well ... bon apetite!

Dave

 

[bobpbx]

I stopped eating 'possum on camping trips after I found one with a well-fed belly crawling out of the body cavity of a foul, maggot-ridden cow's carcass and covered in dripping, smeary putresence.... bon apetite!
Dave

Ugh, that's gross Dave. That reminds me of watching those Komodo Dragons on the Discovery channel eating a very dead, very large sea turtle. Ripping off gooey hunks and smacking them down with their heads reared back.

 

[uuglypher]

>Oh yeah; I do remember that. I scratched them off my menu as well ...

Damn. I lied - forgot, actually. I DID partake of the edible portions of a 6-foot monitor lizard during a stay in Singapore. It was trapped at the Jurong Bird Park where it had been predating the nestlings of several species of captive parrots. The Curator invited my wife and me over for an "interesting curry". We learned in the midst of the meal that the meat ingredient was the monitor we had watched being captured that afternoon. It was prepared as a tikka masala and tasted - unsurprisingly - like ... well, you know...

 

[woodjin]

That story about the 'possum was one of the most disgusting things I ever heard, Dave. That is the last time I go on this forum before heading off to the "All You Can Eat 'Possum night" at the restuarante down the street!

A few nights ago (Friday) I was out in the woods at night and saw a 'possum. shortly after I came up over a rise and caught a great horned owl eating a skunk in my headlights. He took off immeditely. It was pretty neat. He had managed to decapitate the skunk before I came up on him. Big skunk too. Good thing for the owl that they have nearly no sense of smell...bad for the skunk I guess.
Jeff

 

[uuglypher]

That story about the 'possum was one of the most disgusting things I ever heard, Dave.

Always glad t'help with difficult menu choices ...


<...I came up over a rise and caught a great horned owl eating a skunk in my headlights. He took off immeditely. It was pretty neat. He had managed to decapitate the skunk before I came up on him. Big skunk too. Good thing for the owl that they have nearly no sense of smell...bad for the skunk I guess.
Jeff

Yesiree! The top predator in the skunk's nightmare pantheon of deadly enemies is the great horned owl GHO). Fact: the skunk is one of the major wildlife species that commonly is a reservior of rabies virus. A little known facet of that predator-prey relationship is that the GHO is the only bird shown to be naturally susceptible to infection by rabies virus (from consumption of rabid skunk) AND is capable of shedding the rabies virus in its oral and conjunctival secretions. The one experimentally infected and virus-shedding GHO did not, however, show clinical evidence of rabies - never became ill before finally being euthanatized and having virulent virus recovered from its tissues. It has also been shown that several other carrion-feeding avian species (crows, jays) demonstrate evidence of rabies infection (but not clinical signs of the disease) thru demonstration of serum antibody titers against the virus. There is no record of virulent virus having been recovered from these seropositive birds - nor reports that anyone has tried!

See? Y'never know wutchergonnaget from your friendly neighborhood wildlife pathologist (ret.)

Dave

 

[uuglypher]

Brandon-

That's a superlative shot of the red salamander!

Way to go!

I turned over untold hundreds of logs, boards, cement slabs, flat rocks, and other such stuff in damp regions of the pines over the years, and saw lots of neat creatures, but never saw a red salamander!

I must comment that your pics take a really long time to load. Perhaps you could reduce their size to maybe 75 to 150 kB before posting them ? They'll load a lot faster and still look great on the web.

Thanks,
Dave

 

[woodjin]

Very interesting info on the great horned owl Dave. I thought I knew alot about owls but I did not know that. I guess the only way a human being could contract rabbies from one would be if he/she attempted to address an injured specimen and was nipped in the process. Do the owls ever recover from the rabbies infection or do they carry it for the length of their lives? Also, you said that skunks provide a resevior for the virus, but do skunks ever show clinical signs of rabbies infection? I don't recall ever hearing of a rabid skunk. Cheez that would be a nightmare.

Jeff

 

[NJSnakeMan]

uuglypher, im sorry about the large sizes ill remember to resize em . . you could always look on my site because my new pictures are always up there. In the "reptiles" section i added a new water snake picture and new northern ringneck picture. www.freewebs.com/njherpetology

 

[uuglypher]

Very interesting info on the great horned owl Dave. I thought I knew alot about owls but I did not know that. I guess the only way a human being could contract rabbies from one would be if he/she attempted to address an injured specimen and was nipped in the process. Do the owls ever recover from the rabbies infection or do they carry it for the length of their lives? Also, you said that skunks provide a resevior for the virus, but do skunks ever show clinical signs of rabbies infection? I don't recall ever hearing of a rabid skunk. Cheez that would be a nightmare.

Good questions, Jeff-

I'm quick with that info on great horned owls because it was a research project of mine in the mid 70s when I was on the Iowa State faculty. We produced experimental infection in only one owl (a hand-reared, rabies-naive nestling) by feeding it the carcass of a rabies virus-infected spotted skunk. So I'm obviously reluctant to generalize on an experimental number of ONE as to the likelihood of an infected owl recovering from its infection. The other way of stating it would be that 100% of my experimental sample maintained the infection until euthanasia, but that's not my style !

As for skunks, - spotted and striped - yes, they can be infected and shed virus, and transmit it to other animals via a bite, and not be clinically ill. Some skunks can show clinical rabies, but I don't know the proportion of the infected population that do so.

Yes, the folks who should be most concerned about the possibility of owls (and other raptors, and crows, and jays) infected with rabies virus are wildlife rehabilitators, falconers, zoo personnel, and wildlife veterinarians.

If anyone wishes to see the original articles, they are in the J. of Wildlife Diseases in '74 or '75 - in the latter, I think. The senior author was Jorgenson (Richard or Dick, the grad student who did most of the field work). Sorry, all my old office papers are in storage and it would take too damned much digging for me to find them.