Dead Meat

I'm not sure why but wherever I go, if there's a dead animal about it somehow ends up my job to deal with it. In Ecuador I had to bury Paddy, our puppy, in the back yard after an illness did him in (leaving him as stiff as a board, since the girls had left him out for a day waiting for me to get back and deal with the body). In Costa Rica too, I did my fair share of picking through the rotten remains of unhatched turtles trying to work out why they didn't hatch.

I'm at the wetlands for less than three weeks before I'm assigned my first carcass to deal with. A python has died out in the middle of the lagoon and the wardens' have noticed it on their boat tours. Things are busy enough that they forget to deal with it for a good few days and by the time they remember it's developed a somewhat pungent aroma. Knowing this, the wardens quickly decide that handling rotting corpses is one of the key responsibilities of the newly appointed Assistant Warden.

I wait for the last tourists to leave and then I set out in the small electric boat. I convince Michael, the new German volunteer, that a tour around the lagoon would be a great way to get to know the area. I 'forget' to mention the rotting snake to him until after we've cast off. We're ploughing through the lilies before he realises I've duped him.

We arrive at the spot that the wardens pointed out but there's no sign of the snake; the wind must have pushed it away. We circle the area for a while, investigating suspicious shadows on the water but finding nothing but driftwood and debris. With the sun dropping behind the mountains and the light starting to fade, we decide to call it quits. Halfway back however something nestled amongst the lilies catches my eye and I decide to check out one last bundle. It's our snake.

It's huge; at least two meters long and that's without its head (which has been eaten off by fish). Most of its body has bloated to the size of a football, but the parts that aren't bloated are still as thick as my wrist. As we pull up next to it I nearly black-out from the stench; several days stewing in the sun has not enhanced this reptiles natural aroma.

I try to send Michael up front with the rope and an oar to deal with it. He starts to dry retch and refuses to go near it (bloody Europeans!). Resigned, I put the motor in idle and head up myself. I use the oar to lift the heavy, leathery body out of the water and then hook the rope around it and tie it in place. All the while I'm praying that the bloated skin won't split, spraying a horrid gas straight onto me. A few close calls, but the leather holds and I manage to secure the body enough that I can drag it to the shore, trailing it behind the boat.

It's too dark to deal with by the time we get back, so we leave it tied up to the wharf with the rope at maximum extent. I'm first up in the morning however (I'm a morning person) and the wind has changed overnight. The rotten stench fills the visitor centre and there's no way I can manage breakfast. I jump back in the boat and drag the foul thing to the other side of the lagoon.

I climb ashore and push through the long grasses, dragging the corpse behind me and with a shovel over one shoulder. It crosses my mind a few times that this huge python would have spent its happier days in exactly this type of long grass that I'm now waist deep in. I push on regardless and eventually find a clearing, where I dig a hole and bury the thing putting rocks in over the top in an optimistic attempt to stop the feral pigs in the area from digging it up again.

Back at the visitor centre, I disinfect the boat and the rope. I scrub my hands and arms to the elbow. I take a second shower, and then a third later that day. Despite all this a faint stench of rotten snake seems to somehow linger for the rest of the day.