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I’ve traveled to the Pantanal area of Brazil and trust me, at night, when you shine a light across the water at night and see literally hundreds of eyes looking back at you. Those are all caiman.
In Amazonia, the only natural predator of piranhas are the fresh water dolphins aka pink dolphins. I was in my kayak early, early one morning and several piranhas literally skittering across the top of the water. Behind them was a graceful pair of beautiful pink dolphins, feeding early in the morning light.
There are also tourist-type activities where you can swim in the Rio Negro River and feed the dolphins. Remember, where there are dolphins, there are no piranhas so you’re quite safe.
Over the years, I’ve probably done 20 separate trips to Brazil including the one to the Pantanal and three different trips to the Amazon. One was a typical riverboat from from Belem to Manaus and then, two different riverboat/kayak trip out of Manaus.
One of of those kayak trips, we use small lights to “spot” caiman in the water. The light makes them freeze, more or less. If you can get your kayak beside them, you can grab them just behind the eyes around their neck. Obviously, you don’t want to mess with one unless those eyes are very close together. Lol After I caught one, I place him in a small bag and we went back to our boat.
Once on the boat, I took him out of the bag, laid him on his back and stroked his stomach. He went right to sleep. It’s pretty darn cool.
We also caught a three-toed sloth and her baby. After a few pictures, they were both released unharmed.
I love the Amazon but, you better have a good guide otherwise, you can get into a lot of trouble very quickly. I remember our guide caught an electric elk one night....right where we stepped out of our kayaks at a camping stop. I can’t imagine an ell that size with his bite! OTOH, so many of the trees and plants have medicinal uses which comes in handy when you’re stung by something. It’s a wonderful place!
Nice to know you're harassing wildlife on your trips. i'm sure that sloth with her baby clutching to her just loved being caught wondering if you were going to kill her and her infant so you could take a selfie.
Nice to know you're harassing wildlife on your trips. i'm sure that sloth with her baby clutching to her just loved being caught wondering if you were going to kill her and her infant so you could take a selfie.
Some of those on the trip caught and ate piranhas. Not me....they’re a nasty, nasty fish full of parasites. Supposedly, cooking them in a pressure cooker eliminates that danger.
The electric eel was given given to some natives in a village. They were thankful for it. Nothing like that goes to waste.
The slots were unharmed and not panicked at all. They’re sloths.
I’ve traveled to the Pantanal area of Brazil and trust me, at night, when you shine a light across the water at night and see literally hundreds of eyes looking back at you. Those are all caiman.
In Amazonia, the only natural predator of piranhas are the fresh water dolphins aka pink dolphins. I was in my kayak early, early one morning and several piranhas literally skittering across the top of the water. Behind them was a graceful pair of beautiful pink dolphins, feeding early in the morning light.
There are also tourist-type activities where you can swim in the Rio Negro River and feed the dolphins. Remember, where there are dolphins, there are no piranhas so you’re quite safe.
Over the years, I’ve probably done 20 separate trips to Brazil including the one to the Pantanal and three different trips to the Amazon. One was a typical riverboat from from Belem to Manaus and then, two different riverboat/kayak trip out of Manaus.
One of of those kayak trips, we use small lights to “spot” caiman in the water. The light makes them freeze, more or less. If you can get your kayak beside them, you can grab them just behind the eyes around their neck. Obviously, you don’t want to mess with one unless those eyes are very close together. Lol After I caught one, I place him in a small bag and we went back to our boat.
Once on the boat, I took him out of the bag, laid him on his back and stroked his stomach. He went right to sleep. It’s pretty darn cool.
We also caught a three-toed sloth and her baby. After a few pictures, they were both released unharmed.
I love the Amazon but, you better have a good guide otherwise, you can get into a lot of trouble very quickly. I remember our guide caught an electric elk one night....right where we stepped out of our kayaks at a camping stop. I can’t imagine an ell that size with his bite! OTOH, so many of the trees and plants have medicinal uses which comes in handy when you’re stung by something. It’s a wonderful place!
...... After I caught one, I place him in a small bag and we went back to our boat.
Once on the boat, I took him out of the bag, laid him on his back and stroked his stomach. He went right to sleep. It’s pretty darn cool. ......
It's called tonic immobility. They don't actually go to sleep, they are fully awake and conscious of everything but they become temporarily physically paralyzed. It's because of a decrease of blood flow to the brain. Crocs/gators/caimans have two aortas in the heart instead of one and when they're flipped onto their backs their internal organs shift around and one of the aortas in the heart (usually the left side aorta) completely closes, thereby reducing blood circulation to the brain by 30% - 50% and causing the paralysis.
The paralysis doesn't last long though because after a few seconds to minutes there are other bodily reflex survival mechanisms that kick in. Then the reptile's whole body suddenly with no warning begins to twist, curl, flip and thrash around extremely violently in an attempt to get the body rolled back over to being belly side down.
People who put on shows as alligator wrestlers know that the trick of getting the animal onto its back will paralyze it for a short while. But they also know they can only hold it immobile in place for several seconds before it will suddenly become so physically violent so they time the wrestling match so they can jump back and well out of the way in enough time before the paralyzed animal becomes active and starts thrashing for its life.
If the animal is forced to remain on its back for very long it will die from inadequate blood and oxygen circulation to the brain and other internal organs. The only reptile that is known to be able to remain alive in a forced state of tonic immobility on its back for as long as up to an hour and still survive are iguanas, but after an hour it would be game over for the hapless iguana too.
No. On the first trip, we were on a large riverboat from Belem to Manus. There were three classes of service: hammock/no ac, hammock w/ ac and tiny cabins. We opted for two tiny cabins. From my bunk, I could touch the other wall.
On the second trips, we rented a riverboat each time. That came with a cook, a captain and a first mate. We're all kayakers and took folding kayaks with us. We slept on the boat but did camp in the jungle maybe 5 miles from the boat. Thank goodness Brazil allows for two free large suitcases regardless of your class of service. The additional fees weren't too bad.
If you ever want to consider a similar trip, reach out and I'll direct you to one of the guys who went with us. Once he retired, he moved to Manaus so he has good contacts for this sort of thing. Kayaks not required.
It's called tonic immobility. They don't actually go to sleep, they are fully awake and conscious of everything but they become temporarily physically paralyzed. It's because of a decrease of blood flow to the brain. Crocs/gators/caimans have two aortas in the heart instead of one and when they're flipped onto their backs their internal organs shift around and one of the aortas in the heart (usually the left side aorta) completely closes, thereby reducing blood circulation to the brain by 30% - 50% and causing the paralysis.
The paralysis doesn't last long though because after a few seconds to minutes there are other bodily reflex survival mechanisms that kick in. Then the reptile's whole body suddenly with no warning begins to twist, curl, flip and thrash around extremely violently in an attempt to get the body rolled back over to being belly side down.
People who put on shows as alligator wrestlers know that the trick of getting the animal onto its back will paralyze it for a short while. But they also know they can only hold it immobile in place for several seconds before it will suddenly become so physically violent so they time the wrestling match so they can jump back and well out of the way in enough time before the paralyzed animal becomes active and starts thrashing for its life.
If the animal is forced to remain on its back for very long it will die from inadequate blood and oxygen circulation to the brain and other internal organs. The only reptile that is known to be able to remain alive in a forced state of tonic immobility on its back for as long as up to an hour and still survive are iguanas, but after an hour it would be game over for the hapless iguana too.
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Thanks for sharing! I appreciate it. This one was only on its back for a minute at the most and released back into the wild.
I’ve traveled to the Pantanal area of Brazil and trust me, at night, when you shine a light across the water at night and see literally hundreds of eyes looking back at you. Those are all caiman.
In Amazonia, the only natural predator of piranhas are the fresh water dolphins aka pink dolphins. I was in my kayak early, early one morning and several piranhas literally skittering across the top of the water. Behind them was a graceful pair of beautiful pink dolphins, feeding early in the morning light.
There are also tourist-type activities where you can swim in the Rio Negro River and feed the dolphins. Remember, where there are dolphins, there are no piranhas so you’re quite safe.
How do dolphins eat piranhas if there aren't any piranhas where there are dolphins?
Maybe it's the Giant River Otters, whose last and greatest stronghold is the Guianas. Just speculating of course, but my intuition tells me it's because these guys have made the Guianas either unattractive to crocodiles and/or are quick to decimate any nests or young that they find. They are very large apex hunters (the largest of all members of the weasel family) who hunt cooperatively in organized alpha packs (like packs of wolves do) to find and eat caiman and piranhas, so why would they not hunt young crocodiles too? The otter packs are also known to be cooperative with river dolphins on dolphin pack hunts, and river dolphins will kill crocodiles too when they can. So I think it's possible that the otters and dolphins may have / do cooperate with each other to get rid of another carnivorous water dweller like crocodiles that would represent too much competition with them for meat resources. Like I said, it's just a theory.
It could be something along these lines. ^^^. I'm thinking, the fact that there are crocodiles in the Orinoco area may indicate a remnant population of what used to be a more widespread specie. It could be a variety of environmental factors that pushed it back, the above-quoted being one of them, possibly.
How do dolphins eat piranhas if there aren't any piranhas where there are dolphins?
I think what k7 meant was that if there are dolphins around, the piranhas will skedaddle rather than become lunch. So if you're in the water playing with the dolphins, you don't need to be worrying about piranhas coming around to nibble on you. ;-)
It could be something along these lines. ^^^. I'm thinking, the fact that there are crocodiles in the Orinoco area may indicate a remnant population of what used to be a more widespread specie. It could be a variety of environmental factors that pushed it back, the above-quoted being one of them, possibly.
But giant otters also live in the Orinoco. In regards to Orinoco crocodile they get out competed by caimans when their densities fall below a certain point because the caiman has a higher fertility rate. However I don’t know how quickly/slowly the American Crocodile breeds, but in either case that shouldn’t be an issue in coastal areas since caimans are freshwater.
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