Sep
Tropical Life
If You are Squeamish Don’t Look
This morning we had quite an adventure, Cowboy Doug was cleaning up the tiles that were taken down to add a screen door to their condo and he found a big black scorpion. Our first thought was to jar it but that did not work out too well and the scorpion made a quick exit, making us jump in the process.
Unfortunately the quick exit turned into work as it darted into the space between the door frame and concrete that used to be covered by tile. Not wanting to leave it in there Cowboy and Kai (sp?) started thinking of ways to get it out, stick, pliers, outdoor bug spray, filling the area with water – none of those worked.
In a last effort to draw our nemesis out I hit ambushed it with some of Leisa’s skeeter spray and he came staggering out, [ girls to the rescue 🙂 ] Cowboy was ready to get it [ boy job 🙂 ] but only managed his to cut his tail off. Still not wanting to get caught our king size creepy crawler went for cover under the metal door plate. We sprayed each end of that, he came back out and it was bye bye Mr. Scorpion.
I goggled scorpion pictures to see if I could identify our unwanted visitor. From what I saw it looked like a Black fat tail scorpion, Androctonus bicolor but I am not 100% on that. I decided to see what I turned up in a scorpions of Belize search and found the following two interesting links: 10 Wild Things to Watch Out For on Belize First by Lan Sluder and Living Wild Scorpions on Belize Magazine.
Now comes the squeamish part, imagine the long scorpion in the 4th and 5th and 5th picture racing around trying to avoid getting caught in a jar. [ it was slightly longer with it’s full tail ]
That is a great story Gorgio, hopefully, you will make it back soon.
quick story because this never gets old. went to atm cave, dont know how to swim (not really part of the story) did the whole thing, came out in one piece, recommended we all rinse ourselves at the showers in guest area. i go in a stall and the shower curtain had like boats and anchors and mermaids…and 4 peculiar looking things that were not marine life related, were pretty large and they were all scorpions, i darted the hell out of there like i was indiana jones running from the boulder in my boxers screaming bloody murder. had never seen such LARGE critters without the 3 inches of plexiglass you get at the zoo and i was scared shitless. belize is awesome and i miss it entirely so.
I agree not a need to kill it but Cowboy opted to go that route and get the critter gone before his wife came home.
Your scorpion was almost certainly the relatively harmless Centruroides gracilis, a widespread Central American species. The sting at worst can be similar to a bee-sting. Often the effects are much less. It would have been far better to release this outside away from the house, there was simply no need to kill it.
Yikes! Hate those things, and they’re lethal too. I remember seeing my very first tarantula at Altun Ha. The thing was bigger than my head and furry! Freaked me out!
Thanks for the compliment LO. I hope you are enjoying your research and planning, I am sure you will enjoy backpacking across Belize even more.
Hi,
Just want to say that I am currently in the UK planning a backpacking trip through Belize, and that I love reading your blog. The photographs are some of the best I have found to motivate me in my planning 🙂 xXx
Me neither Paul. So far I am happy to be able to say all my scorpion encounters have been outdoors.
would not want to wake up with that on my pillow !!