A Colombian compañera was round last night and we were chatting about the wildlife and fauna of our respective countries. It was like a game of top trumps, but the UK was beat out of sight by their wild stuff. Me - Look out for the nasty stinging nettle! It can give you a little sting that's mildly sore for about 30 mins, but which can be alleviated by a dock leaf. In the worst cases, it can even cause a rash! She thanked me for the warning and told me if I go to Colombia to beware of the 'Burundanga' plant, which on Googling I found goes by the charming English name 'Devil's Breath'. Vice called it "The World's Scariest Drug' just walking underneath its hanging flowers can render you insensible for days. It contains a tasteless and odourless drug called Scopolamine which puts people into a zombie-like state in which they lose both their memory and free will. Colombian criminals like to slip it into people's drinks and then get them to empty their bank accounts and hand over everything they own. Last year, Colombian police reported nearly 1,200 cases. Nazi “Angel of Death” Josef Mengele used scopolamine in interrogations as a kind of truth serum. The CIA administered doses of the drug during its controversial behavioural-engineering experiments in the 1960s. Since the 1970s, Colombian criminals have used scopolamine in order to rape women, empty out houses and apartments, and even abduct children. One infamous case involved three young Bogota women who preyed on men by smearing the drug on their breasts and luring their victims to take a lick. “Losing all willpower, the men readily gave up their bank access codes. The breast-temptress thieves then held them hostage for days while draining their accounts,” Reuters reported. Victims have even been convinced to carry out crimes while under the effects of the drug. “I can give you a gun and tell you to go kill someone and you will do it,”. OK, OK, so Colombia edges that one. Devil's breath is worse than stinging nettles.
Look out for the terrible raptor Red Kite dominating British skies I warned her. It'll take mice, little baby rabbits and some people walking their little dogs have reported them circling. Fierce and terrible bird I said. According to the Daily Mail one evn nicked a fairy cake off the table at a 3 year old's birthday party and gave her a tremendous scare! She was going to counter with the Condor on terms of size, but instead chose The Golden Poison Frog. Beautiful little thing it is she said. Tiny, tiny, the size of your fingernail. Touch it and you instantly fall over dead. It's the world’s most poisonous animal, carrying enough poison in its skin to kill up to 20 humans just by touch. Nice. Another one to the South Americans then.
Colombia does have an amazing variety of wildlife. Probably even more deadly things than Australia, which is full of surprises for anyone using a toilet in the outback.
Yep, jaguars, coral snakes, pit vipers, assorted other serpents (both poisonous and constricting), scorpions, deadly mosquitoes and their diseases and the bullet ant - so named because its sting feels similar in intensity to getting shot. Oh and some nightmare emu-like thing which looks very pretty but which grows 2m tall and will gleefully rip your guts out with its claws whilst cleaving you in two with the axe thing on its head. When I expressed severe doubts about ever visiting Colombia, she assured me that no, no it's fine. As long as you stay in the city.... She also showed us the amazon pink dolphin which lives in sweet water and looks lovely. She had to go though, so we didn't find out the ways in which it hideously kills you.
The bullet ant has the second most painful sting/bite in the insect world. Second only to the tarantula hawk wasp. Saw both when in Costa Rica. Took lots of photos of the latter, not realising what it was, while it attacked a tarantula. Great you-tube videos of people being voluntarily stung and then seeing their “lost control” reactions. Columbia is very much on our list when the world gets back to normal.
It's hardly a surprise that Colombia has lethal and interesting wildlife, generally tropical countries do and as you move towards the poles things become a bit more sedate until to get so far that all that grows is lichens and moss.
I don’t think dolphins are much of a danger to humans if we don’t annoy them. The pink dolphins are the subject of many a dodgy myth, persecution and habitat loss. Colombia’s wildlife would have much to complain about in return.
I would advise the makers of such programmes to explore whether it’s not possible to communicate ideas and facts as effectively through words.
If you were doing a programme on anaesthetics and why they are helpful in surgery, you wouldn’t need some bozo having their appendix out without any to convince you of that. It’s a special human skill, to draw on previous experiences and those of others and imagine. I’ve had a sting from a wasp. That was unpleasant. I can imagine that one from some monstrous looking creature 10x bigger that uses its sting to subdue massive spiders will hurt. A lot. I’ve thought about it and it’s a ‘no’ from me to experiencing it. The only outcome of this video is that my empathy for other humans had a tiny notch chiselled off it.
Correct. Oh I think he's completely mad and no way would I do it. I got a tiny bite from something yesterday and my arm has swollen and itches like hell despite anti-histamines. A bite from one of those insects would probably kill me ! But clearly he has his followers and presumably makes a living doing this stuff.
