Clouded Monitor

adam

adam

Surin relic
My kids caught one of these the other day. My wife wanted to give it to the neighbours to eat, but I stopped her and it was released back into the wild (good luck to him). It was about 6 inches long apparently they can grow up to 1.5m long.

The wife tells me that just before I came home the next door neighbours caught a big one nearly 1m long and they BBQ'd it!

This is the first one I have seen in 14 years here, I also saw my first wild tarantula the other day. It is nice to see more wild life coming to our land, I just have to stop the natives eating them (Pla wanted the spider for FIL to eat!!).
 

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Good for you , Adam. I'm not a reptile expert and would have figured it for a gecko.
It is easy to see monitors in Lumphini Park usually wherever birds and waterfowl congregate.
 
Coffee said:
Good for you , Adam. I'm not a reptile expert and would have figured it for a gecko.
It is easy to see monitors in Lumphini Park usually wherever birds and waterfowl congregate.
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You would have seen the difference straight away, much bigger and different colour, long claws and big head. If there was a large adult and now a juvenile, there must be many more as the clutch is up to 20, so I'll be on the look out for more. The wife was worried as she says that they eat chicks (I'm trying to convince her that is not the case until they are big). It was funny as she first told me that it was a lizard that can kill a buffalo (meaning a Komodo Dragon). I had to explain that they only live on Komodo Island in Indonesia, then I remembered that I was on Komodo Island last month!!
 
Yeah, Komodos are Huuuuge !
Supposedly they won't take you down if you're not threatening by keeping a good distance off (as they're quick) and they have an easier food source (well fed).
I wouldn't want the giants walking around my house.
 
Glad you gave it a temporary stay of execution, Adam.
The first one that I saw was in Surin and easy bigger than a metre. Unfortunately it was tied up and on its way to a villagers pot.


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first thought this post should be in the Tech forum until I read it. Unfortunately the locals eat anything that moves here in my village, I do have a lot of pity for animals like this lizard.
 
Coffee said:
Yeah, Komodos are Huuuuge !
Supposedly they won't take you down if you're not threatening by keeping a good distance off (as they're quick) and they have an easier food source (well fed).
I wouldn't want the giants walking around my house.
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monitor.png
 
I've never seen one here, but have seen them in Singapore (same species, I think). The best place is Sungei Buloh Nature Reserve, where full-grown ones are common. You see them basking in the sun.... but as soon as they see you, they're off. Not aggressive.
 
I assume they are territorial, so I am surprised we have not seen or heard of them until now and if the adult was about 1 metre, I'm amazed nobody has seen it before, you know what the villagers are like!. In my first year here at around 5pm one day all of the village went out to the local river as someone claimed to have seen a BIG fish! Literally the whole village was at this river looking for this big fish. Now I have lived here for a long while I now it is impossible for there to be a big fish in the river as it would have had to negotiate hundreds of nets and traps, or lived undetected for years.

Have any of you seen tarantulas in Thailand, I know they are common in Cambodia as every cooking program goes and finds them. I saw one a few years back and I'm afraid to say I killed it. I was digging the land by my house to grow some peanuts and I turned over a sod and there it was, I was so shocked, it got splattered by my next swing of the spade! But there is now one living in the bank of my pond, I have kept Ta away from him!
 
I saw one when I stayed near Prasat. Big hairy bugger that scurried away (unharmed). That was the first and last time in 10 years.


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I have always had arachnophobia and the only good spider is a dead spider in my books. I have become more tolerant with time and if they co-operate with me they get to live. They get shown the garden wall at the end of a scoop. I am not sure I could manage a tarantula and I certainly would not want one as a pet. This is the stuff of my nightmares.
 
nomad97 said:
I have always had arachnophobia and the only good spider is a dead spider in my books. I have become more tolerant with time and if they co-operate with me they get to live. They get shown the garden wall at the end of a scoop. I am not sure I could manage a tarantula and I certainly would not want one as a pet. This is the stuff of my nightmares.
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She's in there Nomad!!
 

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Thanks Adam, I really appreciate you attaching the files and not opening them up. I didn't open the photos either. LOL.
 
adam said:
She's in there Nomad!!
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Thank you for your interesting post. Last night I had some tasty cheese on biscuits. Cheese has a habit of making me dream more than usual. Vivid dreams, crazy dreams if you know what I mean. Well, I have just awakened from a deep slumber and I was a film director intent on catching a tarantula spider to star in a movie. I remembered your 'post' and thought that may be a good place to start. I woke with a start and forced myself to do some background reading on how best to locate and catch said beast. Did you know:

"Different species of tarantulas mate at different times of the year. In desert areas, after a rainstorm, huge numbers of males may be seen at night, wandering around searching for females. Ground-living species enter the burrows of females to mate with them, whilst tree-living species find their mates by scent and by following the silken trails the females leave as they move.


The eggs develop in the female's body, or in an egg case which the female carries between her front legs. Up to 3,000 eggs may be laid, the larger spiders laying the most eggs. They take 2 - 3 weeks to hatch and the spiderlings spend the first few weeks of life in their mother's burrow or another safe place.


The young spiders may take many years to mature. The ones living in tropical forests take only 3 to 4 years but the American desert species can take up to 10 years."

ARE YOU ALONE?
 
Take comfort, Nomad. Any creature which lays 3,000 eggs faces HUGE mortality somewhere along the line. Otherwise you would have tarantulas lurking in every cranny.... and then some.
 
isanbirder said:
Take comfort, Nomad. Any creature which lays 3,000 eggs faces HUGE mortality somewhere along the line. Otherwise you would have tarantulas lurking in every cranny.... and then some.
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If just one of those eggs hatched out and survived, and it happened to be living in my house right now, I can tell you there would be 3 people screaming their heads off, SWMBO + 2 daughters. I would not be screaming as I would be out of the house and off down the road like a bat out of hell. LOL.
 
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