P, Poisonous Things All Around

By Carly

            This weekend, my family and my Dad’s friend’s family went to a little bed a breakfast called Woody House near Sun Moon Lake near Taichung.  It sounds like a preschool but really it is a frog B&B.  It sounds weird, but it is actually really fun. 

            Before dinner, a person came up and started talking to my Dad’s friend, Frank, in Chinese.  He understood because he is Taiwanese, but he and his wife can speak English, too.  It turns out, the woman asked us to come on a nighttime nature walk.  We said yes.

            First, we walked down to the parking lot and got flashlights.  Everyone turned their light on and we walked to a little manmade pool that the B&B kept to attract frogs.  We looked at one brown, water frog.  Then we put rubber boots on and walked down to a small pond and on a leaf beside the pond was a little, neon-green frog that you could hardly see because it was exactly the same green as the leaf.  I got to hold it!  Its fingers were round and sticky so it could climb trees.  When I held it, it stuck to my hand.  When you hold a frog, the good way to hold it is by the lower, hind legs.  The guide said that if something were to eat this green frog, the frog would poison the animal.

            After I put the green frog down, we all went to a stream and looked for more frogs.  We didn’t find any.  Instead, we found a small, green snake that was so poisonous that if you got too close and it bit you and if you didn’t get to the hospital in time, you could die.  At first, we couldn’t see it at all because it was so well camouflaged.  Then our eyes hit the right spot and we saw it.  Our guide knew it was poisonous because of its triangular head.

            We walked on.  Near the place we were going to get out of the stream, we saw an enormous plant.  It was probably ten feet tall!  It had huge, white flowers that looked like trumpets.  Our guide told us that it blossomed in the night and if you touched it and then licked your fingers, or if you ate it, you would get poisoned. 

            When it was time to get out of the stream area, we climbed up a big ladder and started to walk up to the B&B.  While we were walking, my Dad noticed a toad.  He ran up to tell the tour guide.  When she came back, she said it was the toad she had been hoping to show us.  It was slimy, bumpy and it had sticky skin.  She said when it was scared, poisonous liquid would seep out of its back and poison whatever wanted to eat it. 

            I have never been to a nature walk quite like that one where everything was poisonous, and I don’t think I’ll forget it for a long, long time!

The neon-green frog

Rachophorus Taipeianus - Taiwan green tree frog

The snake is at the top of the rock in the center of the picture.  It is hard to see.

         

The sticky, slimy, poisonous toad