Night Hike

With our spotlight charged and ready, we headed out for a short night walk in the rainforest.  You see nocturnal animals at night that are not out during the day. It did not take long for Greg (our premier animal spotter and guide) to find a kinkajou sucking nectar from the flowers in a large balsa tree.

Kinkajou - Image source: www.bite.ca (Animal of the Week:Kinkajou)

There were not too many flowers on the tree, so the kinkajou did a lot of moving from one branch to the next. Look at the photo--I think kinkajous are so cute, but being nocturnal, they do not make good pets since they are awake when I want to sleep at night.

Bufo Toad

The kinkajou was not enough for our short hike, Greg also showed us a giant Bufo toad.  This toad was so large that I would definitely need 2 hands to hold it.  By the way, I did not hold it because I was not sure if it had poison glands in its skin that would cause a rash.  The toad prefers to come out at night because it might dry out in the hot daytime sun and it has fewer predators at night. 

Bat from BCI

And we still weren’t done seeing cool nocturnal animals!  When Greg shined the spotlight to look for animals, we saw dozens of bats flying through the beam of light.  No worries, though, there are 70 species of bats on this island and only one (vampire bat) will bite a human.  If you look carefully at this photo that scientist Rachel Page took, you will see a frog being caught by a frog-eating bat.

Tarantula out at night

Look at the photo of a tarantula that was just sitting out in the open near it’s home (a hole in the ground).  It was looking for a nice meal, but stayed close enough to it’s home that it would not become a meal for another predator.  Well, I have to say, that sure was a power-packed night hike-kinkajou, huge toad, bats, and a tarantula!  Thanks, Greg!  

- Fran Zakutansky