Toads That Have Pockets and Other Weird Beasts

 

 

The creeks ran all around the village of Santa Maria, and so to all intents and purposes we were living on an island. The creeks, I found, were full of vast numbers of baby caimans, and I was very anxious to catch a good supply of these. I soon found out that it was not quite as simple as had been the capturing of crocodiles in the Cameroons. For there you wade along the shallow streams and catch them on the sandbanks. The creeks round Santa Maria were far too deep to do this, quite apart from the fact that they were inhabited by other things besides caimans, such as electric eels and a vicious and bloodthirsty fish called the piranha, both of which would make unpleasant bathing companions. So, in order to capture the baby caimans, I had to adapt my method for hunting crocodile to the country I was in.

We had a big canoe and went off down the creeks late one night, taking with us a big torch and a long stick with a cord tied to the end, which terminated in a slipknot. I sat right up in the bow of the canoe, holding the torch and this stick, while the paddler in the stern propelled us slowly and gently across the dark waters. I soon found that the baby caimans preferred to lie in the places where the weeds were thick on the surface, with just their noses and their bulbous eyes sticking out. As we moved gently along I shone the torch to and fro over these patches of weed, until eventually I saw the fiery glow of a baby caiman’s eyes some thirty yards away. Using my free hand to signal, I guided the paddler in the stern until we came to the edge of this weed patch and then signaled him to slow down and eventually stop.

Keeping the beam directed into the creature’s eyes, I leaned forward, slipped the noose of cord gently over his head, and then, with a quick jerk, pulled him right out of the water and into the boat where he wriggled and uttered loud indignant snoring grunts. As soon as they heard these protests, all the other baby caimans for miles around started grunting in sympathy, but this proved to be their undoing, for by listening to hear the direction from which the grunts came, I could tell where the greatest number of them were hiding, and it was not long before I had a bulging sack on the floor of the canoe which wriggled and slithered as the reptiles moved inside. This great quantity of caimans made such a noise that we could not progress any farther, for everything for miles around could hear the canoe coming with all the baby caimans grunting in unison.

 

 

One of the strangest inhabitants of this watery world of creeks was the pipa toad. It is probably one of the most extraordinary amphibians in the world, for it is quite literally a toad with pockets. I caught some of these strange creatures in a small leaf-choked channel leading off one of the big main creeks. They were so very like the messy decomposed leaves that at first sight I did not recognize them as anything living. They measure about five inches long and look rather like very flat leathery brown kites with a leg at each corner. They did not spit and struggle when I picked them up, as most toads and frogs would do, but lay quite limply relying on their resemblance to the dead leaves to protect them.

One of the specimens I caught was a female with eggs, and I was particularly pleased with this, as it gave me a chance to watch the astonishing hatching of the baby toads. When the female lays her eggs, the male presses them into the skin on her back which has grown soft and spongy in order to receive them. So at first they look like transparent beads half buried in the brown leathery skin. Gradually the half of the egg that is above the skin hardens and forms little convex lids, so the eggs remain in the mother’s back in this series of pockets and slowly change into tadpoles and then into tiny toads, each one so small that it would take six of them to cover a postage stamp. When the baby toads are ready to hatch, the edge of the eggshell sticking above the skin becomes soft, and, by wriggling and pushing, the little creatures manage to push the lids back, like trapdoors, and then by much exertion they manage to haul themselves out of their strange potholes – like nurseries in their mother’s back.

This big female that I caught in the creek lands spent her time in a big tin can, lying on the surface of the water, quite still, and looking as though she had not only been dead several days, but as though decomposition had already set in. Gradually, I watched the eggs on her back harden into little lids, and then I waited patiently for the baby toads to make their appearance. In actual fact, they put off their entry into the world until I was on the homeward voyage and halfway across the Atlantic, when they chose the most awkward time to appear.

It was about midnight, just when I had finished the work and was thinking of retiring to my cabin, that I glanced at the female pipa toad before switching out the light in the hold and saw a strange little black twig which appeared to be growing out of her back. On looking closer, I discovered that one of the small lids had been pushed away and this black object was the tiny arm of a baby toad sticking out of his nursery and waving to and fro. As I watched, he managed to get the other arm out and then his head, when he paused for a moment and looked for all the world like a tiny black workman coming out of a manhole in a road.

It took him about four or five minutes to get out of his nursery, and he lay there for some time on her back, apparently exhausted by his efforts. Then he slid off and plopped into the water, where he started to swim around merrily. I waited there patiently, and presently another of the tiny lids was pushed back and a second baby toad started to wave his arm at me.

As I was squatting there, absorbed and fascinated by this extraordinary sight, I was joined by two sailors who, coming down from their watch on the bridge, had seen the light on in the hold and had wondered if there was anything the matter and, if so, whether they could help. They were rather surprised to find me crouching over a tin at that hour of the night and asked what I was doing. I explained the history of the big female pipa toad and how we had caught her in the mysterious creek lands and how, now, the babies were busily hatching out of her back. The two sailors squatted down beside me and watched the arrival of yet another baby toad, and soon they became as fascinated as I.

Presently, the three of us were joined by yet more sailors who had wondered what had happened to their companions. Once more, I told them the tale of the toad with pockets and they too became so intrigued that they sat down to watch the hatching of the toads. When one baby, more weak than the others, took an extra long time to get out of his pocket, the sailors grew very worried and wanted to know if they could help him with the aid of a matchstick, but I explained that the baby toad was so fragile that the matchstick would appear to him like a tree trunk, and however gently we tried to maneuver it, it was more than likely to break one of his thread-like arms or legs.

Eventually, when this baby hoisted its toes out of the pocket and fell in an exhausted heap on his mother’s back, there was a general sigh of relief. Dawn had broken before the last of the toads plopped into the water, and we rose from our cramped positions and went down into the kitchens of the ship to see if we could beg an early-morning cup of tea from the cook. But in spite of the fact that we all yawned over our work that day, we agreed it had been well worth sitting up all night to watch the arrival of the baby toads.

 

 

The pipa toads were not, of course, the only unusual amphibians to be found in the creek lands. Guiana seemed to have more than its fair share of unusual toads and frogs. Next to the pipa toads I think the strangest we caught was the paradoxical frog. We first came across evidence of this creature late one night when my friend and I were dredging a small stream to see what we could catch. Presently, my friend called to me and said that he had caught the strangest creature: it looked just like a tadpole, except that it was about six inches long, with a body about the same size as a hen’s egg. My friend and I had a long argument as to what this peculiar beast could be; he insisted that it must be some kind of fish, as if it were a tadpole it would grow into a giant frog. I was just as certain that it must be a tadpole. It was only after we had argued for some time that I suddenly remembered having read about this weird amphibian, and then I knew that the creature we had captured was the tadpole of the paradoxical frog.

The paradoxical frog’s life history works in the opposite way to an ordinary frog. With a common frog the spawn hatches out into tiny tadpoles, and these grow until on attaining a certain size, they develop legs, their tail is absorbed, and they crawl out on to dry land as a medium-sized frog. This is one of the most extraordinary things in the world, for the paradoxical frog is bigger when k is a baby than when it is fully grown.

Another curious frog found in this part of South America is the pouched frog. This little beast cares for its young in almost as unusual a way as the pipa toad. The female pouched frog has a long slit in the skin of her back that opens into a sort of pocket; into this the eggs are placed, and the female more or less forgets about them. Inside the pocket the eggs change into tadpoles, the tadpoles grow legs and their tails are absorbed, and when they are ready for the world, the mother thereupon splits the skin down her back, and out pop the babies, each not much larger than the knob on the top of a knitting needle.

One of the smallest but most powerful amphibians caught by us in Guiana was the poison arrow frog. These are small tree frogs, each measuring perhaps an inch and a half long, and decked out in the most wonderful colors and patterns. There are several species, and they might be red and gold striped on a cream background, or pink and blue on a black background, or any other combination of colors. They are very lovely little things, and a jar full of them looks more like a mass of highly colored sweets than live creatures. To the Indian tribes these little frogs are most useful. They catch a number and put them close to a fire. As soon as the frogs start to become hot, they exude a kind of slime from their bodies, which the Indians scrape off and collect. This slime, prepared in a special way, is a most potent poison, and the Indians use it to dip the tips of their arrows in. Thus, when the arrow strikes an animal – even a quite powerful one, such as a wild pig – the poison works very rapidly and kills the beast. So, for the Indians, each of these little tree frogs is a miniature poison factory in itself, and whenever they need fresh material for their arrows they go off into the forest and collect a number of the frogs from which to manufacture it.

 

 

 

Chapter Eleven

 

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