A side hobby often attached to my job in the army, is collecting and preserving specimens so people can have a real life visual aid to know what to stay away from! I have become slightly competitive with our specimen collection here in Honduras. You can only imagen the kinds of things we have on display in our office! Central America is some what of a goldmine for crazies like me. I'll have to do a post later to show you guys the jaw dropping bugs I've found around here!
This post however, is a documentation of my first time attempting to preserve an AMPHIBIAN! That's right people. When our military police brought in this Diamond Back (I think) Rattler, I was so excited to get started! ....and said a little prayer I wouldn't trigger any remaining reflexes that would cause, what I've come to call, a "Ghost Bite". You see, even after snakes are dead, they can retain certain reflexes, for a given amount of time, that will lead to an even more dangerous bite, releasing an uncontrolled amount of venom. You may ask, "Why didn't you just wait a few days longer before handling her?" My answer, "The more time sitting in that Gatorade container, the less fresh and preservable of a specimen. Not to mention, the MP's brought her to me covered in ants! If I wanted her to stay pretty, I had to act quickly. No saying how long she had already been gone, or how much damage had already been done. If I wanted to preserve her gorgeous body in it's full glory, it was time to act. FOR SCIENCE!
Getting my supplies ready.
Formalin, syringe, preserve jar, forceps, gloves, and a mask I ended up not using.
Thanks to Mariah (aka my battle buddy for life) for taking some pics for me! She hates snakes and did funny dances and squealed the whole way through. Such a trooper! Stick with the people jobs battle. ;) <3
The Military Police/JSF's version of collecting a specimen.
Her head was hard to get out of there! I was trying to be super gentle.
Time to wash off the ants and Gatorade juice!
Coiling her up pretty.
Gorgeous. (See that rattler?!)
Here I am squirting formalin in her mouth to help preserve her insides
and hopefully keep her from floating.
She ended up sinking some more over the night. The next morning I should have taken her out and shot some formalin into her body using a needle because she wasn't heavy enough to sink to the bottom with the oral method.....however.....after all this, I just lost the stomach. I'll know better next time!
