Unwanted Critters Aboard

Whether we like to admit it or not, we all have problems from time to time with unwanted critters aboard. I'm not talking the domestic variety; I'm talking the 4 or 6+ legged variety. An occasional spider (small) is tolerable. You can't do much about the errant fly that comes in through the open companionway. Mozzies we don't like, so our screens are always in use when they're around. No, I'm talking about any critter that invades and gets out of hand aboard. I'm talking about the other creepy-crawlie varieties like roaches and rats, for instance. Eeewwww! We've never had a rat aboard, but if you tie up to a waterfront dock, the chances increase significantly that one will get aboard. We've certainly seen them up close, dead and alive. There are rat guards that some folks put on their docklines which at least give the rats something to think about as they're figuring out how to get around them. Once aboard, they eat and gnaw at everything including wood, wiring and foodstuffs. It ain't pretty and they're hard to get rid of. Traditional rat traps eventually do the trick, we're told, but it takes awhile and you have to hope they die in the trap and not get away wounded to die in some obscure place on the boat.

I remember friends in Ecuador who hailed the fleet about 8pm one night when a boa (no legs) crawled up their anchor chain, came down through their open forward hatch and settled comfortably in their head. Maureen nearly had a heart attack when she went forward to do her business that evening. A local guy finally went out to help them and, we're told, had the boa for dinner the next night. Rest assured, we never eat what we catch if it's been living on board!

When Jelly was aboard, she was great at bringing critters in as opposed to keeping them out. Huge moths (usually with a bite out of their wings) and small birds were her specialty. They were always deposited on my side of the bed and never truly appreciated.

We've been inundated by flies on occasion. One time in particular in Gloucester, Massachusetts, they about drove us crazy. David sat in the cockpit like the Mad Swatter, gloating and laughing maniacally each time another body was added to his growing pile of carcasses. He wanted to mount their little dead bodies on toothpicks as an example to the other flies, but I had to stop him.

Roaches are probably the biggest worry aboard. In the colder climates like here in Tassie, we'd never seen one ... that is until we tied up to the Elizabeth Street Pier. Roaches seem to like the undersides of pilings and piers. David spotted a few at low tide when our view of the underside of the pier was best. We hadn't seen any aboard and we sprayed the lines which we think deterred them from making any forays onto Cups. At least, we haven't seen any yet. What's the gestation period for roaches? Three weeks maybe. We're still on the look-out.

In the tropics, it was hard to avoid roaches. When you buy groceries, they're in the plastic bags. If you set your backpack down for minute on the floor, they crawl in. They lie in wait in packaged cardboard boxes of macaroni or crackers. They crawl inside bunches of bananas. We began leaving all of our groceries on the dock or in the dinghy, removing every item from its bag, box or over-wrap and inspecting it carefully before allowing it aboard. A hassle for sure, but much easier than trying to get rid of a whole herd of undesirables later.

Weevils present another issue in the tropics. They seem to come as an extra added protein bonus with your flour and grain purchases. You know how flour usually comes in heavy-duty paper bags? The tops are just folded over and glued shut...always a little flour loose at the top? Weevils seem to thrive in that floury environment and the poor packaging does nothing to deter them. I add bay leaves to all my dry goods canisters as a deterrent to unwanted bugs. I spread a few bay leaves around in our food lockers, too. It seems to work.

We've had bees and wasps aboard in great numbers especially in the tropics when we've had hands of bananas hanging from the boom crutch. We learned quickly to move the fruit elsewhere on the boat and never bring it down below until we're actually using it. We watched in dismay as an entire swarm of bees invaded the boatyard in New Zealand and visited Nine of Cups for a half hour or so. We were off the boat as we watched them land and were very, very relieved when they decided there was nothing there to warrant their attention any longer.

Ants were the bane of my existence for awhile. First, flying ants which came in swarms aboard the hardstand boats in Ecuador. It lasted for just a few days, but man were they ever thick. I fought with tiny little ants from Panama to Chile and they nearly drove us nuts. We watched one day at Shelter Bay Marina while we were on the hard. They marched determinedly up the hull and onto the deck and of course, found their way below into my galley. We sprayed them; we tried to drown them; we stepped on them; we used ant cups. Nothing seemed to work until we got to Chile's cooler weather.

We thought we'd share a recipe for Roach Cookies that has been effective for roaches and other creepy crawlers in the past. Obviously, keep them out of reach of children and pets.

Roach Cookies:

3 parts boric acid powder

1 part flour

1 part sugar

milk

Mix dry ingredients with enough milk to form a thick paste. Roll out or put teaspoon size dollops on wax paper. Let them air dry. When dry, cut into roach-size servings. Actually, we put a teaspoon full of paste in used plastic bottle caps and to let them air dry. We then distributed the caps throughout the boat. The roaches munch and then take some home to their kiddies. It works wonders without using toxic sprays.

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Days and Ways to Celebrate

A daily list of mostly obscure holidays and fun ways to celebrate them.

Sci-Fi Day

Isaac Asimov's birthday (1920-1992). His most famous work is the Foundation Trilogy.

Try reading or watching some sci-fi to celebrate.

Swiss Cheese Day

Not only eat Swiss cheese, but if you're up to your eyeballs in projects, consider the Swiss cheese scheduling approach...leave a few holes in your schedule.

Worse than snakes

I'm an arachnophobe. I have an illogical, unexplainable fear of spiders. I've listened to all the gardeners' spiels about how wonderful spiders are for eating up bad insects. My parents chided me as a child for being afraid of “something so tiny” compared to my size. I read Charlotte's Web and loved Charlotte, until I remembered she was really a spider. It may be an irrational fear, but it's very real. The very thought of them gives me goosebumps. Years ago, I nearly wrecked my Dad's car when a very small spider announced his presence by gliding down his web from the sunscreen and dangling directly in front of my nose while I was driving. My son used to hide plastic spiders in the freezer and the ice cube tray to terrorize me. The ultimate was when both sons announced they had a new pet named Regina. Turned out Regina was a black widow spider who lived in a window well and they'd been feeding her flies. Out came the can of Raid and Regina was history despite the “Mom, you're so unfair” histrionics from the boys.

We spent a day in the Darien Jungle hunting for elusive harpy eagles. Our 5-foot tall guides had no problems scooting under the spider webs which hung over the damp, thickly overgrown path. Being 5'9”, however, had me eye to eye with one spider about as big as a Buick. I screamed, knocked off my hat and David did a quick spider check much to the amusement of the locals. I hollered in Spanish “I'm afraid of spiders. I hate spiders.” Unfortunately, the word for spider in Spanish is very close to the word for sand. You guessed it...I was screaming about my fear of sand, not spiders. Something definitely got lost in the translation.

In Fiji, I was admiring a cool t-shirt hanging on the wall in a little rural shop, thinking I'd buy it as a gift. Until...a very large brown hairy spider crawled out from behind it...a huntsman. The buying decision was immediately recanted and this buyer made tracks.

Access from the boat to the lovely resort at Palmlea in Vanua Levu, Fiji was along a beautiful tree-lined, grassy path. Several huge yellow orb spiders strung webs between the trees and hung about 10-15 feet over the pathway. There was definitely enough head clearance, but I cringed and hurried my step every time we walked up that path.

So here we are in Australia where some 2,000+ spider species live...that's about 1/17 of the worldwide identified 35,000 spider species. Scientists think there are probably many more unidentified species...but we really don't need to go there. Of the 2,000 species here, only about 17 species are harmless to humans. I was scared to death that I'd meet up with a Sydney funnel web spider when we were in Sydney or a Blue Mountain funnel web when we went traipsing through the Blue Mountains with Doug & Fay last year. Our Aussie friends, David and Marly, sent us a funny YouTube video about the red back spiders that have a penchant for dunnies (outhouses). They especially like to hang out under the toilet seat. After the floods in Waga Waga this year, millions of sheet weaver spiders invaded the area covering the whole town in webs that looked like snow. Yuck!

Heading into the toilet block here in the marina the other day, I didn't notice a large huntsman all scrunched up in a corner of the toilet stall about three feet away from where I was sitting. I was in a no-move situation when I spotted him. He stretched. I cringed. He moved. I shuddered. I spoke to him calmly and passively. “Don't move, you big hairy bastard, till I'm done and out of here.” I don't usually swear, but I figured I'd stun him with my tough language. It worked. He froze. I finished, without taking my eye off him for a second. I slowly stood up; he inched. I repeated my harsh words with more venom in my voice this time. He remained stone still. I opened the door and slid past him like a wraith. Now every time I go into the toilet, it's an inconvenient, but necessary, time consuming effort to check the stall environs for eight-legged invaders or slithering ones or slimy ones. Since David & Marly's YouTube presentation, I check under the seat, too.

Though I hate spiders, I do appreciate their handiwork...all eight hands worth.

Slither

I really dislike snakes. David is ambivalent towards them, but there's no ambivalence for me. I mean I REALLY dislike them. There are lots of snakes in Australia. In fact, there are about 170 different species of snakes here on land and in the sea. Eight of the ten most poisonous snakes in the world call Australia home, yet snakes are protected animals in Australia. To make you feel better, only 25 of these baddies are actually capable of killing humans. What a relief! Not that I wish them harm, but geez, they seem to have enough protection of their own with all that venom. We had our first encounter with a venomous brown snake near the marina in Bundaberg right after we first arrived. We were taking a walk and we barely saw a trace of him as he slipped under some cane stalks and slithered on his way. In fact, we weren't totally sure we'd seen a snake at all and quite honestly, we weren't interested in finding out. The eastern brown snake is responsible for about 60% of all the snakebite deaths in Australia. Several other folks had seen snakes in the same area. We avoided that path thereafter.

On my birthday in November, springtime in Australia, we headed to Burrum National Park for a day of hiking in a tropical paradise. I had my camera and I mentioned that I was hoping to see a snake far enough away to be safe, but close enough to allow me to photograph it without feeling intimidated. I got my birthday wish. What we thought from a distance was a large branch fallen across the path was instead a carpet python blocking our way. I photographed part of him as he slid back under the dense fern foliage. I found myself mesmerized by his size and undulating motion. At least pythons are not venomous. They're constrictors and just squeeze you to death. According to experts, the largest python on the continent is nearly 20 feet long and capable of eating large wallabies (or small children). I'm not sure this was a snake I wanted to meet or photograph. We watched as our python specimen slowly eased his way into the underbrush and I stayed determinedly in the middle of the path for the rest of the hike.

We note that there are always several brochures available for snake first-aid in the tourist centers. We read them: No tourniquets, just pressure bandages. Don't let the snake bite victim move. Identify the snake. The Bundaberg Port Marina even offered a first-aid seminar to cruisers for snake bites and had professional snake handlers on hand for demonstrations. That was reassuring.

Now that we're in Tasmania, I thought it would be too cold for snakes. But, no...there are three varieties here...all venomous. We spoke with the locals and several confirmed they'd never seen a snake here, so we felt pretty confident we'd never see one. What we forgot is that most Australians, like most Americans, don't tend to go out in the bush too much and most live in urban areas.

We sailed the boat into Macquarie Harbour, on Tasmania's west coast and then up the Gordon River. This was about as far from “urban” as you can get. It's described as “the western wilderness”. Across from historic Warner's Landing where we'd tied Nine of Cups, we waved at a kayaker who paddled by to say hello. Bob, an octogenarian kayaker no less, was camping across the river at a bush hut and we invited him to dinner aboard. During the course of our meal, he mentioned the "caretakers" that were local residents. Two large tiger snakes, the most venomous snakes in Tassie and third most venomous in Australia, liked to sunbathe on a rock behind the hut. He invited us over to take a look. Did I really want to see them?

There were no snakes in sight as we beached the dinghy the next morning. Bob met us and confirmed he hadn't seen the “boys” yet, but if we waited for few minutes, they'd probably show up. I half expected them to lurch out at us at any moment. We chatted and waited. Sure enough, a small tiger snake about 2' long poked his head up between the slats of a rotting, wooden drainage grate not far from where we were standing. As he lifted and extended his body, I could see the orange and black stripes on his underside that earned him his name. His tongue flickered and he slithered out of hiding across the porch along the side of the hut and into the grass. I could feel my skin crawl and the hairs on my arms stand at attention. I was even less than enthralled when Bob shared the fact that these slitherers can swim and they're pretty good tree climbers, too. As the little fellow disappeared behind the hut, two other tiger snakes, much larger by a couple feet, appeared, heading for the favored rock. That was enough for me. I climbed back into my skin and headed for the dinghy. I later read that tiger snakes are diurnal and generally favor cool moist areas and tussock. They are abundant near human settlements and are responsible for several fatalities.

Here in the marina, I enter the toilet and shower block with a bit of trepidation. I always check around carefully. The entry door is not raised at all and the locked metal gate is designed to keep out people, but not slithering critters. I envision a huge snake coiled up in a corner somewhere when I head in to do my business. The toss-up is whether the spiders or the snakes will get me … and then, of course, there are always the slimy worms.

There have only been six deaths in Australia attributable to snakebites since 2000. I read that bites usually occur when someone accidentally steps on the snake. It makes them irritable. According to statistics, we'd be more likely to die from a horseback riding or scuba accident or a lightning strike. Hmmm...I think we'll continue walking with our heads down.