Nicaraguan Animal Parade

I promise I’ll eventually get to a post about the botanical life from my trip to Nicaragua, but today I thought I’d cater to my animal-loving friends! We saw so many animals on our adventure–some were pets, some were future dinners for a family, and some were strolling around minding their own business. I’m amazed that I didn’t get a picture of the many, many stray dogs we encountered–probably because I felt badly taking a pic of a creature that looked like it might be living its last days. The stray dog issue is a big one in Nicaragua–and they are starving, mangy and flea-ridden. OK, now that I’ve thoroughly bummed you out on the stray dog issue, let’s move on, shall we? I have pics here that will make you say, “Aw!” “Oh, how sweet!” “Yuck”  and lastly, “I just threw up in my mouth a little bit.” I will let you decide which is which.

How cute are these little guys? While on a 3 1/2 hour hike through the mountains near La Concha, we almost missed this mama chicken with her peeps right off the side of the path. Perhaps they belonged to a nearby family; we don’t know. Not a sight I’m used to seeing back home!

Now these guys were resident cluckers at the eco-hotel, La Mariposa, where we initially stayed. Paulette, the owner of the hotel, has many animals there–and these are the epitome of “free range.” These birds had the run of the place and went where they wanted to!

Little baby pig! Unfortunately, probably someone’s dinner at some point, but he sure is cute now! He definitely belonged to a family; he was roaming around the yard when we hiked by.

There’s something very different, to my mind, between a cute little baby pig and a huge hog on the side of the road. As we were trekking along, I suddenly heard this guttural snorting on my right. Imagine my surprise to find this hog rooting around for an afternoon snack about 4 feet away from me! Awesome! Awesome, but not exactly cute and cuddly.

Four of the seven hotel dogs at La Mariposa–they usually ventured around at least in pairs, and entertained us in the evenings with their dogly shenanigans. Two in particular loved to play fight every night while we ate dinner outside on the patio. The littler one usually won. Yes! Let’s hear it for the underdog! (Whoa, pun not even intended there.)

Paulette had an aviary at the hotel, filled with several different species of birds. She had two toucans–and we felt very fortunate to have gotten this shot of one of them. They were very shy and would quickly fly around the corner whenever we tried to see them.

We took a boat tour around the isletas off the coast of Granada and caught a view of some egrets. I kept waiting for it to turn around to get a good shot of its face, but no luck. Maybe he’s as shy as the toucans.

These little white-faced monkeys had been captured to sell as pets–and they should not be pets. Paulette saved them (not sure if she had to pay or what) and now they’re guests at the hotel, with their very own outdoor suite. They’re adorable but scampy– if you’re not careful while you’re feeding them bananas, they’ll try to get into your shorts pockets in hopes of making off with some additional goodies. Smart little buggers, but you can’t stay mad at these faces too long, can you?

How about sitting in an open-air cabana for dinner and having a lizard saunter over to you? Good thing Brett’s not squeamish! We work outdoors, after all.

Remember the 3 1/2 hour hike I told you about? We saw this up in the trees and were intrigued, but had no idea what we were looking at. Guess what we were looking at? A termite hive! Now, that’s really gross. Can’t you just imagine them all swarming around inside, just waiting for the right opportunity to escape and start chewing on your house?

This concludes my Nicaraguan Animal Tour for you–please do stop by again soon to view more pics from our trip. Who knows, some might even be of plants. This is a garden blog, after all.

You might also enjoy these articles: