All creatures great and small
Category: Orangutans, Other wildlife, Tanjung Puting National Park (TPNP), Uncategorized | Date: Feb 07 2008 | By: admin
I see the number of comments my posts are attracting has shot up. However, the comments also make me think you are a strange lot. Here I am supposed to be writing about orangutans, I tell a nightmare story about spiders and I get a deluge of replies! If you want more horrible spider stories, stand by because here’s another one.
Thank you F. J. PECHIR for telling me the spider, an arachnophobic’s worst nightmare, that I had in my bathroom, was in fact harmless. It is reassuring but I have to question the use of the word “little”? I could joke that I too would handle them with a telephone directory, but I totally accept your point that spiders are part of a healthy ecosystem. I just wish they weren’t part of mine!
A couple of years ago, on an orangutan survey, I felt something on my arm. To my horror I discovered it was one of the long legged spiders shown in the photo below (can you identify it F.J. PECHIR?).
Now, in a perverse kind of way, I had always wanted to know what I would do if I had a big spider on me: would I freak out, throw a blue fit and probably get bitten? Or would I freeze? That experiment has now been conducted and I can tell you the instinctive reaction is to freeze. At least until your friendly, local field assistant flicks it off. I would like to be able to tell you I then cracked a joke and carried on just as Indiana Jones would do. That, however, is a club I am not a member of.
One of the sayings (gross generalisations?) you hear about spiders in Borneo is “if they climb walls or sit in webs, they are harmless. If they run on the ground or have burrows, they are bad”. Photo number 2 is a bird-eating spider. You guessed it: it lives in a burrow, is incredibly aggressive and is huge. The first one I ever saw was picked up in the car headlights as it crossed a road! I do not know how many birds they catch but they are certainly partial to mice.
The photo of the stag beetle is thrown into as a challenge to any palmetto bugs out there!
I also thought you might be interested to see some pictures of Camp Leakey, the original study site of Dr Galdikas. When you are in Camp Leakey you do get a sense of history; some of the orangutans she talks about in her autobiography “Reflections of Eden” are still there today.
The release of rehabilitated orangutans at Camp Leakey ceased in 1995 but many of the ex-captive orangutans, or their offspring, still wander in and out of Camp. Observing the ex-captive orangutan’s behaviour provides an insight into orangutan intelligence that couldn’t be gained from wild orangutans. The apparent ease with which they imitate human behaviour (washing laundry, opening locks on doors) confirms just how intelligent this great ape really is!
It’s all about team work!
I know I promised I said I’d write more about orangutans soon. Tomorrow I’ll make good on that promise, as this afternoon I have to go to the Orangutan Care Centre Quarantine. There will be a story soon!
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8 Responses to “All creatures great and small”
F. J. PECHIR, on 07 Feb 2008
Hi Stephen, I can understand your feel about spiders, certainly they are impressive! I mentioned “little ones” just in a friendly manner because I love spiders and I see them as babies (well, not only spiders but every animal and plant in the world!). I will copy your photo of the web spider and take it home to make an id., I know the sp. but don´t remenber its genus right now, but for the momment I can tell you that is a female, the male is only about 5% the size of the female and feed on leftovers of what the female hunt in her web. There can be more than one male interested and fighting for the copulatory rights with the female in the same spider-web, but only one will inseminate her introducing his sperm sack in the female´s gennitalia with one of his pedipalps, and once he has finished he will segregate a milky substance that will become solid in contact with the air that will block the female´s gennitalia to prevent others males to copulate. Some authors commonly named it “net spiders” because the webs of some species of this same genus were sometimes traditionaly used in some islands by local people to make a kind of little fishing nets to catch small fish; do you know that the webs of some spp. is actually more resistant that steel? proportionately, of course. The bird spider belongs to the migalidae group and certainly is a big spider but not represents a real danger to humans if properly respected or handled. Your pictures are great and the information too! Your blog is realy interesting and better every day! I look forward to learn more about your work! Thank you again.
Pam/Shell Beach CA, on 07 Feb 2008
OK F.J. but does it bite???
F. J. PECHIR, on 07 Feb 2008
Hi Pam, this species commonly only bite to kill its main prey, insects. It is not considered dangerous to humans since its quelicers are too small and weak to provoke an immportant damage to human tissue. I´m talking about the first spider. About the second one, it is also considered a non-dangerous to humans, but bites from this big spiders commonly known as “tarantulas” can inflict some local damage to the bite´s area when not adecuately managed, but the bites are extremely rare, since this arachnids prefer to scratch the dorsal part of their abdomens with its legs to send out flying the irritating hairs that cover that part of its body in self-defence. The name “tarantula” has been used through time to designate this kind of big spiders, and has an european origin, but this species do not live in Europe! Scientificaly speaking, this name could be better asigned to a much smaller cousins of the migalidae, the wolf spiders, that inhabit Eurasia and the american continent.
paula, on 08 Feb 2008
Love the team work photos - primates are so great. Have you ever seen them laughing, playing jokes on each other (or you?). This is really a sign of intelligence. I had a vervet monkey steal my cap once from my head, climbed a tree, put it on his own head and then jeered at me bobbing his head from side to side as I yelled for my hat back. I’m certain he was enjoying it!
Sheryl, Washington, DC, on 08 Feb 2008
I am so not a fan of bugs, but the orang pics are great! Last night was the last session of my class “Intro to Primates” and we had an overview of the great apes and the conservation challenges facing them. That was the depressing part. I left class feeling pretty low, but these pictures are a great reminder of why your work is so critical and why we must support it.
s.
THERESA SISKIND, on 08 Feb 2008
Ok Stephen, you win! Your stag beetle is very impressive (but he can’t fly like my palmetto bugs)! F.J., I just read recently about how strong some spider webs are, neat stuff. Now for those cleaver orangs, gosh, I just can’t get enough of them. I wonder if their intelligence is on par with chimps? I think so.
Annie/Texas, on 10 Feb 2008
YIkes…….I could not handle the bugs/spiders!..I know they all serve a purpose some how….The orangs are adorable….and so intelligent! Love them! Thanks
THERESA SISKIND, on 11 Feb 2008
Yes Annie, they do serve a purpose, our orangs eat insects as a source of protein in their mostly vegetarian diets. Bon Appetit!
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