World Wild Vet Read online

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  Back in 2006, I decided to head out into Irwin’s country to experience it for myself. Capturing something even a little bit like the videos my idol made was on my mind as I laid out a route that would take me to destinations all over Australia. I wanted total freedom to make the most of the trip, so I decided I would do it by myself. Just a man and a camera on the open road.

  I rented a four-door compact car and loaded it up with an atlas, my field guides to Aussie wildlife, my camera and tripod, a homemade snake hook, cans of beans, crackers, and peanut butter. I also brought along a pillow and a sleeping bag, and I filled almost the entire trunk with water bottles. At that point, pretty much all I had left was gas money, but I didn’t care.

  The first item on my agenda was to go swimming with whale sharks. The Ningaloo Reef, on the northwest coast of Western Australia, is one of the best places in the world to see them. It was a thirteen-hour drive from where I got the car, but I was so excited I covered the entire distance in a straight shot. I lost track of time as I cruised along, with the turquoise waters of the Indian Ocean on one side of the road and lush, open landscape on the other.

  Whale sharks are the biggest extant fish species in the ocean. They are humongous—as long as forty feet or more. For reference, a seventy-two-passenger school bus is thirty-five feet, so we’re talking a bus length and change worth of shark. People often spot these fish from planes flying overhead. Despite their size, whale sharks are filter feeders who basically spend their lives scooping up krill and plankton and other small sea life, so they don’t pose any danger to humans (unless maybe you swim into one’s mouth or get slapped by its enormous tail). The combination of their peaceable nature and their preference for shallow depths makes them ideal to observe in their natural habitat with little more than some luck and a snorkel.

  I arrived in Ningaloo late, ate some beans from a can, slept in my car, and was standing on the shore with snorkel in hand at daybreak. My camera stayed stowed. This was going to be an experience I’d just have to remember in my mind’s eye—my equipment was basic grade and definitely not waterproof.

  To catch a ride on a small boat going whale sighting, I forked over the price of a few days’ beans and water. Fifteen minutes out, we spotted the polka-dotted pattern of a whale shark out ahead of us in the crystal-clear East Indian Ocean. He was bigger than an elephant, bigger than a car, bigger than my childhood bedroom. Just. Massive. I was so thrilled I kept turning to strangers on the boat, shouting, “DO YOU SEE IT?!” As if anyone could possibly miss it.

  What happened next remains one of my favorite wildlife experiences of all time. (Fair warning: you’re going to hear me say those words a few times in this book.) Our boat stopped, the captain gave us the nod, and I was over the side, in the sea, and cutting across the water with the most powerful stroke I could manage. Yeah, I’ll admit it: I wanted to get to him first. Unlike the manta rays, this was an animal not easily spooked by a swimmer.

  This was the biggest animal I’d ever seen up close and personal. A behemoth with the telltale anatomical structures of a shark—classic dorsal fin and tail fins, smooth white lines down his body. I could see his massive fins but not his face. I quickly realized that if I was going to get a look at him—or observe any part of him for long—I was going to have to pick up the pace. The whale shark appeared to be making zero effort to cut through the water, but I was paddling my ass off and barely keeping up. Ten minutes in, I was gasping and sputtering, trying to gain just enough on him to see the front. Twenty minutes and my lungs were on fire, my heart pounding out of my chest, my mind blown by the experience. And then he finally decided he wasn’t in such a hurry (or took mercy on me).

  The shark slowed in the water and began a gradual, gentle turn in my direction. This was my chance. I swam even harder, pulling away ahead and off to one side, so I’d be waiting for him. You’re not supposed to get out in front of them. A whale shark won’t eat you, but it could bump you. It could open its crazy-wide mouth (up to five feet across!) to catch some krill and stop your heart with a display of its hundreds of rows of tiny teeth. You could disturb its peaceful swim. Even as excited as I was, I knew better, and I moved a bit farther to the side and swam on, ahead now, periodically glancing back.

  And that’s when he turned just enough for his whole face to come into view. He was the biggest adorable thing I’d ever seen. His eyes were spaced far apart, and his big mouth was open slightly, so that it looked like he was flashing me a giant, floppy grin.

  Hello, friend! I waved a tired, leaden arm at him and thought to myself, You’re never, ever gonna forget this moment.

  The whale shark kept gliding forward; I stayed put. I couldn’t swim anymore. Even fully immersed in the water, I was sweating profusely and physically spent. Fitness experts say swimming works nearly every muscle in the body—and I was already feeling most of them. I lazily made my way back to the boat and crawled aboard, exhausted and completely satisfied.

  Monitor Moment

  After swimming with the whale sharks, I doubled back up the coast and headed to an area called the Kimberley. The northernmost of the nine Western Australian regions, the Kimberley is huge—about the size of California. It’s remote and sparsely populated, with only around thirty-five thousand permanent residents. Imagine California with thirty-five thousand people instead of nearly forty million and you start to get the idea of just how far it is between towns in this region and how long you can go without laying eyes on another soul. I was there to visit the region’s national parks, including Tunnel Creek, Purnululu, El Questro Wilderness, Mitchell River, and Windjana Gorge.

  The scenery at Tunnel Creek, at the top of my list, is not what most people come to Australia expecting to see. Rather than desert or beach, it’s composed of craggy, steep-sided mountains. Sandstone and limestone form jagged peaks and deep, rocky gorges. Inside the park, its namesake creek has carved a massive tunnel through the center of a mountain. It’s a land of rock and water, with sunny ledges and sweet hiding places—a perfect environment to look for some of my favorite creatures on the planet: lizards and snakes.

  Toting my camera bag and snake hook, I climbed up a boulder-strewn path to the entrance of the cave. I made my way inside, wading through the areas where the creek had no bank. The trek was about a half a mile in all, and I had to break out the flashlight a few times to find my way. When I exited the cave at the far side of the mountain and let my eyes adjust to the sunlight, the first thing I focused on was a massive sand monitor resting on a rock.

  I love monitors. I had a pet savannah monitor for years. She was my first lizard love. (I had an iguana before that, but I was crazy about that monitor lizard.) I got her when I was in high school, and I named her Rex because she looked so much like a dinosaur, but I swear she had the personality of a teddy bear. Rex was always by my side when I was home. She loved to hang out anywhere warm, so if I fell asleep on my back, she’d sprawl out on my stomach and doze there. I’m still the only person I know who’s been willing to sleep with that particular kind of pet.

  The monitor I was looking at was gorgeous, black and yellow with thick scales running along the inside of his forelegs, which ended in thin fingers and long, sharp claws. This big male was more than five feet long and easily over twenty pounds.

  I remember thinking, This is where it starts. This was the kind of opportunity I’d been looking for: my first subject, first video. I ran toward the monitor. He dove for a burrow, but he was too big to fit. The last third of his tail was sticking out.

  I couldn’t believe my luck. I frantically set up my camera, keeping one eye on the big guy because I knew I had only seconds. Then I squatted down beside the burrow, braced myself, and wrapped my hands around that big scaly tail. I slowly worked my way up until I could pull his entire body out.

  A note about capturing reptiles: they may not like it, but they don’t react the way mammals do. Typically, after a quick burst of energy, lizards and snakes, c
rocs and turtles settle down and become passive and tolerant. In many cases, as long as you aren’t hurting them, they’ll put up with a little handling and you can part ways with no harm done. Mammals, in contrast, panic and stay terrified for too long. Many really think they’re going to die. Fight or flight kicks in and their heart rates rise, their respirations become deeper and faster, and they completely freak out. I never want to cause that kind of panic in an animal unless I have to (for instance, to perform a veterinary procedure or take necessary conservation measures), so even though I admire and treat all kinds of animals, I almost never go out looking to catch a mammal.

  But the monitor wasn’t a mammal, and he was too fascinating to ignore. Back on the ledge, he was staging a protest at being so rudely taken from his comfy hole. I waited out the hissing and clawing and trying to bite my face off, holding him just firmly enough and far enough away that he couldn’t do me any harm. All the while I marveled at the heft of him—I’d never held a monitor nearly that large (or any reptile that large). When he stopped trying to kill me, I gripped him with one hand and started setting up my shot with the other. I was about to make my first wildlife video!

  What I hadn’t anticipated as I stood there looking at my camera was how uncomfortable it would feel to know the film was finally running. I had so much I wanted to say, but I couldn’t seem to spit it out. Three or four times I tromped back to the camera, fifteen-pound monitor still in hand, to start again. Finally I did a take where I talked about his size, habitat, and diet—me in absolute awe of this beautiful creature, him occasionally trying to mangle my face.

  The entire process probably took ten, maybe twelve minutes, but it felt much longer. At the end I left the camcorder running as I put my new Aussie buddy on the ground, took a couple giant steps back, and watched him scuttle off into the wild.

  I was so damn proud and happy in that moment I could have climbed that craggy mountain and pounded my chest. I had done it! The search. The catch-and-release. The setting up of equipment and stringing enough words together to tell the story of an amazing animal. And I had the tape to prove it.

  The Road

  Given that I was nature hunting in the country believed to be home to more deadly species than any other, there were times when I probably should have been scared. I wasn’t. I was too excited to be there. One of the rare exceptions was a night early in the trip when I woke up in the passenger seat of my rental car (which was also my bed) thrashing around and soaked in sweat. I’d had a nightmare in which two guys jumped into the back of the car and were holding me at gunpoint. That was so many years ago, but I still remember what those dudes looked like. I’m no psychoanalyst, but it seems to me that deep down I was more afraid of people than of any other creature.

  I headed south toward the middle of the country—the outback—to see Uluru (Ayers Rock), Kings Canyon, and the domed rock formations collectively known as the Olgas. I’ve taken a lot of road trips in different countries since that one in Australia, but I’ve never been anywhere where you can see a car coming from so far away. Once you get out of the cities, the roads are broad and expansive, the land is flat, and there are no streetlights or fences along the highways. It’s so dark it’s almost eerie. In such total darkness, sometimes you can see headlights from fifty miles off.

  Because the roads are so remote and so dark, there was roadkill everywhere. In the mornings, I’d often come upon the carcasses of wallabies, kangaroos, emus, lizards, and snakes being eaten by buzzards and other birds of prey. I even saw buzzards that had been hit by cars while mindlessly gorging on the victims of the road. One night, driving in the wee hours, I spotted a kangaroo in the distance—a common occurrence. I slowed and stayed focused on where it was, my eyes scanning the periphery of the headlights. As I got closer to the spot, I lost sight of it. Then, without warning, it darted back into the road a few feet in front of me. I instinctively swerved and slammed on the brakes, sending the car into a skid. It didn’t have anti-lock brakes, so it kept skidding for at least fifty feet.

  The only evasion I could muster wasn’t enough. I was still skidding forward at around twenty miles an hour when I clipped the kangaroo. It went flying into the air, then crumpled to the road.

  When the car stopped, I jumped out and ran to check on the kangaroo. It wasn’t moving. I crouched next to it, feeling for a pulse. Nothing. I waited a minute and tried again, probing under the soft, woolly fur, but there was no heartbeat.

  I knew I had to drag the kangaroo off the road, or its presence might wreck the next driver speeding down that wide-open highway, so I hoisted it up and hauled it a few feet from the shoulder. Then I got back into the car, my mind replaying the last minutes, wishing I’d seen the animal sooner, swerved faster, stayed five more minutes the last time I’d stopped for gas. I hadn’t been to vet school yet. I hadn’t learned how to coexist with death. I felt wrecked, more alone than I’d been since I’d started the whole trip, and guilty. I was out there to appreciate nature and see Australia’s beautiful animals, and I had killed one.

  After a few minutes, I started the car, put my hands on the wheel, and pulled away. I figured the buzzards would arrive at dawn to clean up the mess I’d made. This wasn’t the kind of memory I’d come to Australia to make, but I knew it was one that would stick with me.

  Kakadu

  From the middle of the country, I drove to a region in the Northern Territory that locals call the “Top End.” The area is kind of like a massive wetland, with endless swamps and waterways and waterfalls to boot. I was there during the wettest time of year, when all the plains are flooded—perfect conditions to find crocodiles, lizards, and snakes.

  Top End’s Kakadu National Park is the largest of Australia’s national parks. It spans more than seven thousand square miles and has been home to the Aboriginal people for over fifty thousand years. I could spend a year in this park and not begin to explore all the facets of its waterfalls and woodlands, plains, rivers, and coastline. With only a few days available to me, I chose to focus on the animals. In the daylight, I encountered marsupials and saltwater crocodiles and wildly exotic tropical birds, including hundreds of unbelievably loud groups of cockatoos. But it was at night that I really found what I came for. Kakadu was the site of some of the best night cruising I’ve ever done. Night cruising to a reptile lover means getting behind the wheel in the dark, taking it slow, and keeping your eyes on the road for creatures to meet.

  They were everywhere. The road actually serves as a hot rock for reptiles. The asphalt retains heat, so cold-blooded animals seek its warmth. A reptile’s metabolic function is dependent on the external temperature, so if you put a reptile in sixty-degree weather, its entire system will slow down. In ninety-degree weather, with some exceptions, it’ll be in go mode, as if it’s had a shot of espresso. For the cold-blooded, temperature changes everything—making the difference between a snake or lizard that’s easy to catch and handle and one that’s alert, fast, and snappy.

  Each time I spotted a new species of wildlife, I tried to make a video, so I was steadily getting more comfortable with the camera. One night as I drove slowly down a deserted road, I came to a section littered with debris from an overhanging tree. Among the straight and angular lines of the branches and twigs, I spied the curves of a smooth, rounded S: Snake! Practice had taught me that the best way to do this was quickly. As soon as I saw the snake, I stopped the car, leaving the headlights on, grabbed the hook from the passenger seat, and ran toward the figure on the pavement. At six feet out I could see it was a python, between four and five feet long. Pythons aren’t venomous, so I dropped the hook and scooped the snake up in my hands before it could slither away.

  My find was a beautiful olive python, and she felt smooth, heavy, and cool as I picked her up. She was calm, and we checked each other out for a second before I supported her midsection with my palm, giving her enough room to move her head, then guided her to coil herself around my arm so she’d feel secure. With the snake on
my left arm, I got back into the car and eased it off the road, grabbed my camera and tripod, and proceeded to set up, one-handed, in front of my headlights.

  When the camera was ready, I hit Record and stepped back in front of it, holding the gorgeous snake up to the lens and then pulling her back toward me to get both of us in the shot.

  “Look at this beautiful girl,” I said. “She’s an olive python, and she and I are in the only place in the world where you can find a snake like this. This one is about five feet long, but the species can grow to more than twice that length—they’re big snakes. This one probably eats ducks and other water birds, small- to medium-sized mammals like rodents and wallabies, and even the occasional reptile. She’s a crafty hunter who can catch prey in water or on land. She may look intimidating, but this snake poses absolutely no threat to people. She’s not venomous, and she’s not aggressive. Look at what a sweetheart she’s being for me, and we only just met. I just found her and picked her up, and she’s content to hang. It’s a tragedy that olive pythons like this are often victims of mistaken identity—to the untrained eye, they look an awful lot like the venomous king brown snake, and many people kill them on sight.”

  As I wrapped up my summary, the python started unwinding, looking to move her head farther up my arm. Time to let her go. I packed up my gear, labeled the tape, and added it to the growing collection I had in a box on the backseat.