posted
That looks like some kind of monitor or goanna. They are poisonous, but only mildly so, and only if they bite you hard and long enough to grind their back teeth into the bite. The poison won't kill you - it breaks down the flesh and makes the area of the bite really susceptible to infection. It was only discovered a few months ago that monitor bites resulting in a nasty infection was actually due to this venom, and not to the fact that monitors just have really icky mouths. I wish I had lizards like that on my roof. That's way cool. Posts: 1225 | Registered: Feb 2002
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I am amazed at people being jealous of the lizards on my roof. Honestly, I really am. This is... just a little too weird for me. I mean, I can understand it - if I was in your shoes reading about all this, that might be my reaction. But I'm strange!
Seriously, y'all, any of you want to come visit and experience lizards out your bedroom window (the pics I've taken of the lizards on the roof have been taken out of upstairs bedroom windows), you're more than welcome! Posts: 8355 | Registered: Apr 2003
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We have lizards in Florida, but they are cute little lizards.
There was a little green lizard stuck in my daughter's window the other day, and we opened the window so he could escape.
Posts: 5771 | Registered: Nov 2000
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posted
quid, you know it's all your fault. I started reading this thread last night, and then I went and looked at the lizards on roof link, and then I started looking at a bunch of your other Sri Lanka pix (hope you don't mind), and then it was really really late . . .
and now I'm sleepy! what an interesting life you're leading. From Canada originally, right?
Oh, and Fahim looks a lot like a friend of mine who's half Sri Lankan. They could be siblings.
Posts: 3149 | Registered: Jul 2005
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posted
kq, the borax and sugar kills the ants so incredibly well, it's delightful! Except that the big brown ants don't like it, won't touch it, and so it doesn't kill them. But it's killed every other variety of ants we have here. Yep, I'm delighted, too.
Uprooted, of course I don't mind you wandering through my photos - it's what they're there for. Yes, I'm from Canada, and Fahim's totally Sri Lankan. He's just really really pale compared to the rest of 'em.
kojabu, should I take pictures of centipede sex for you? O_o
Posts: 8355 | Registered: Apr 2003
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posted
I have Borax. I have sugar. I have many many red ants. What's the ratio?
My 7 yr old "innocent" son was very amused at the two monkeys at the zoo, who he must've thought were getting ready to play football or something.... Posts: 1522 | Registered: Nov 2005
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posted
Jenna, I did a 1:1 and it worked just fine. You should know how it works... The ants pick up the sugar/borax and take it back to the nest, where it's redistributed among the colony. So it kills the entire family - and it takes 2-3 days.
Here, where the humidity levels are so high, the sugar/borax will melt into a slab of the stuff in a couple or three hours rather than stay as individual crystals. So, when I put it out, if it's inside, I put it on a yoghurt lid or some such for easier cleanup. Outside, I don't particularly care.
With those tens of thousands of ants, I put out a few piles of sugar/borax that were each a couple of teaspoons and it did the trick. I probably didn't need to use anywhere near as much as that.
Good luck and may you be quickly ant free!
Posts: 8355 | Registered: Apr 2003
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posted
I think the lizards are really cute too! How fast do they move? I'm so glad the lizard escaped.
Would it be a good idea to lean a ladder (or build an easier escape path) to allow the lizards to climb out if they fall in again? What if one that's a whole lot bigger falls in? It would be nice to have something like that in place ahead of time, so you don't have to worry about it when the times comes. It might help Oberon as well, especially as he gets older and less able to jump long distances.
I have found various ways to coexist with animals here where I live (in a wooded area). I really love the feeling I get from being friendly with the local fauna. It's just awesome to look out the back window and see birds, chipmunks, squirrels, cats, racoons, etc. paying me a visit.
If lizards scare you, I promise that doing things to help them out in little ways will end your fear.
Posts: 6246 | Registered: Aug 2004
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posted
My mother will be so proud. Her homestyle non-toxic ant-killing solution worked. Even on mutant Sri Lankan ants. Except the ones that probably only eat meat or something.
Posts: 21182 | Registered: Sep 2004
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Tatiana - when that lizard was startled, it moved at a pretty good pace. Faster than me, that's for sure, but I'm out of shape. Not faster than my cat, and he's pretty lazy for a cat. Um... I don't know how fast in miles per hour or kilometers per second or... And yeah, I'm also glad the lizard escaped, believe me.
From the site that sarcare provided (which is an excellent site, by the way, on everything from monitor lizards to all the varieties of geckos to other reptiles in Sri Lanka), it says that the monitor lizards here get to be 1.4 meters long, or 55 inches, or 4 feet 7 inches long and just over 10 kg, or 22 pounds. So the biggest one on our roof is about as big as they get. Hurray for that, at least.
And yeah, considering that this is the third (at least) time that a monitor lizard has been trapped in our back yard in the last 7 months, it might actually be time to consider doing something to help them escape.
But no, I will retain my fear. C'mon, I scream when I see geckos, and they're only two to six inches long. Oh hell, I scream when I see those tiny little frogs at my in-law's place in Kurunegala, and those are less than an inch!
kq, the one species of ants that won't eat the borax/sugar will eat leaves and other plant matter, so they're not exclusively meat eaters. Posts: 8355 | Registered: Apr 2003
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posted
Does Oberon stay away from the borax/sugar mix on his own or do you have to keep him away? I'm assuming it would hurt kitties too. Hmm, actually, I wonder what it would do to monitor lizards...
Posts: 4515 | Registered: Jul 2004
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posted
He doesn't go near the stuff. Well, he smells it, then sometimes he sneezes, and then he goes away.
Thing is, I don't know that I really want to kill the monitor lizards. By all accounts, they're why the squirrel and rat population is under control and why we don't have more bugs in the house, so I think we'll just leave them alone.
Posts: 8355 | Registered: Apr 2003
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posted
Goody, my mom recommends the soap and sugar thing specifically because kitties (and babies) can ingest enough to know they don't want to eat it without being hurt.
I don't know what it would do to lizards...
Posts: 21182 | Registered: Sep 2004
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posted
Shouldn't do much if anything. Borax works by causing scratches in the insect's exoskeleton. The insects dehydrate and die.
(Diatomaceous earth works much the same way.)
Since reptiles (and mammals) lack an exoskeleton, and all evidence indicates that one would need to ingest HUGE amounts of borax to get sufficient to be harmful by ingestion, they should not be affected.
Posts: 32919 | Registered: Mar 2003
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posted
aspectre, that is the oddest video I think I've ever seen. What in the heck was it? I feel sorry for the poor lizard. How did it get mixed up in that business anyway? It was minding its own lizard business, and then what happens?
Posts: 6246 | Registered: Aug 2004
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posted
She lives in Sri Lanka. Did you miss the whole "Dear Hatrack, I'm getting married and moving to Sri Lanka" thing? (Which, I believe, was actually after the fact?)
Posts: 21182 | Registered: Sep 2004
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posted
I was waiting for someone to ask that or explain the joke. There's a South Park episode where they're hunting the legendary "Mexican staring frog of southern Sri Lanka," which kills you if you look at its face.
Posts: 781 | Registered: Apr 2005
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posted
Omega, I do indeed live in Sri Lanka, although I came from Canada. I moved here in August 2003 when I flew over to meet the man who's now my husband, and kq is wrong on one score - I wrote that Dear Hatrack I'm getting married and moving to Sri Lanka thread before I actually left Canada. About eight days before, I think.
And nope, we don't have animal control here.
We have a front yard and a back yard - they're not connected - and off the back yard, we have two doors, one out our living room, the other out the servant's area. The day that the lizard got in our house, the back door off the servant's area was open.
The lizard got into our yard - probably fell off the wall or the roof - and started looking for a way out. I took pictures - with a flash - and the flash startled the lizard. Or perhaps it was because the lizard heard me and it got scared. In any case, it ran from the windows off our livingroom around the back of the house and took its only "escape", which was, of course, into our servant's area.
The lizard was not about to go out the way it came in - it was too scared - and it kept looking for a way out. Twice, it ended up running behind the washing machine and getting caught, so Fahim had to climb onto the counter and poke it (gently) with a broom to get it out from behind the washer. I, of course, was in the kitchen, which is separated from the servant's area by glass windows and a glass door, so I could see everything and even take some pictures but couldn't be hurt by the lizard.
Eventually, after the lizard tried clawing through the door that leads to our front sitting room and climbing the stairs that leads to bedrooms upstairs, Fahim opened the garage door and herded the lizard out that way.
It then ran through the gaps at the bottom of the gate door.
It took about a half hour or 45 minutes to get it out of the house. And Fahim was not happy with me for taking pictures. Flash really scares the things. And that's also why the pictures from the lizard incident last week are flashless - didn't want to startle him.
Did I mention that, after Oberon figured out the lizard was no big deal, that he just plopped himself down and watched? Didn't bother moving until it was over. That is one relaxed cat!
Posts: 8355 | Registered: Apr 2003
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quote:Originally posted by quidscribis: I wrote that Dear Hatrack I'm getting married and moving to Sri Lanka thread before I actually left Canada. About eight days before, I think.
*remembers* People thought you were pulling our collective leg at first. Posts: 32919 | Registered: Mar 2003
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quote:Originally posted by quidscribis: Really? I don't think I knew that.
Pretty sure. Certainly the thought crossed my mind initially. I thought I remembered people posting responses to that effect, but perhaps that was a dream.
I definitely do recall the thread that spun off into the Dear Hatrack thread.
Posts: 32919 | Registered: Mar 2003
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And no, I'm not surprised it was the first thought. The whole thing sounded pretty unbelievable - of that, I am most certainly aware! And yet, here we sit, neither of us poisoned or stabbed or chopped up into little bits and stashed in the freezer yet. Go figure. Posts: 8355 | Registered: Apr 2003
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And now, of course, I'll have to consider that as an option the next time the lizard falls off the roof.
Posts: 8355 | Registered: Apr 2003
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posted
This is where the teenaged local boys come in-- hire them to hack it up with machetes. Or the local equivalent. *needs to sleep before evil completely takes over*
Posts: 21182 | Registered: Sep 2004
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posted
quid, if one of those lizards have a difficult time getting out of your backyard, how in the heck do they get on the roof? They look too big to climb trees very easily.
Posts: 697 | Registered: Nov 2005
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