BOAS AND BANDIDOS IN HONDURAS

Trip was a mess, but fun

Even with lost gear and luggage, Poly professor Emily Taylor made the most of her recent trip to study snakes

By Nick Wilson

Cal Poly snake expert Emily Taylor recently spent a week on a tiny island in Honduras known for its abundance of boa constrictors—a trip that normally would have been a reptile researcher’s delight.

But Taylor and three colleagues found themselves without their research equipment or even a change of clothes.

The local assistant biology professor now describes her ill-fated journey humorously on her own blog. But she admits the travel mishaps were frustrating at the time.

“I knew there would be some good adventures,” Taylor wrote. “But I had no idea that a whole week

of these adventures would be done in one pair of socks.”

Taylor told The Tribune that she and three researchers from out-of-state universities used a Latin American airline that lost their luggage. Their bags contained research equipment worth thousands of dollars— not to mention clothes and toiletries.

After arriving in Honduras from the U.S., the group boarded a cross-country flight to the coastal city of La Ceiba.

But airline officials said a truck assigned to transport the luggage hadn’t arrived. Taylor says she can’t be certain what happened, but she has a theory.

“We think they were stolen by bandidos,” Taylor said. “We think somebody on the inside was paid off.”

They lost $7,000 worth of gear and the humidity on the isolated island of Cayo Menor off the east coast of Honduras made their trip a sweaty and, ultimately, smelly one.

“We alternated between pouting, boa hunting and iguana catching,” Taylor noted.

The local biologist—who keeps 21 pet rattlesnakes at her Santa Margarita home — said the research island of Cayo Menor is about one-quarter square mile in size and loaded with about 3,000 3-to 6-foot-long pink boa constrictors.

The group intended to study the total body water content of the snakes to see if they become dehydrated in the dry season compared with the wet season. Taylor’s friend Chad Montgomery, a faculty member at Truman State University in Missouri, is leading that study.

Stymied by the setback, the group decided to use some equipment left at Cayo Menor to assist with a different project. Montgomery also is researching why snakes on the island are smaller than those on the mainland.

So the group changed plans and documented such details as the locations of snakes and body temperatures.

At night, Taylor washed her clothes worn on the flight from the U.S. by hand and wrung them dry.

Taylor jokes that the biologists spent one night drinking away their disappointment in losing their equipment with rum procured from staff members who work on the island.

And during the day, Taylor saw three snakes at once, a rarity for snake researchers, she said.

“Considering the circumstances, we had a really great time,” Taylor said.

This week, the scientists received $1,500 each in reimbursement from the airline for lost bags. But if she’s to do it again, Taylor says one thing will be different.

“I’m getting travel insurance,” she said.

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Emily Taylor’s blog can be read and her photos viewed at

www.snakeymama.blogspot.com .