Intense nature video

Last night I watched Rain Forest, Selva Verde: The Green Jungle from PBS' Nature series. Immediately, this ranks as one of the best wildlife documentaries I've seen (and I've seen a lot). I think it's out of print, but may be available from your local library.

• I love sloths. Cute, slow, deliberate, and surpisingly successful in a very strenuous environment. Sloths move so slowly that their fur is always wet, as a result green algae grows on them as additional camoflague. Of course, I've always enjoyed the fact that sloths come down to the jungle floor only to defecate and only once per week. But did you know that special moths permanently live on sloths, and lays its eggs in the sloth's feces?


• The jaguar is hands-down the world's most beautiful cat, although cheetahs and snow leopards come close. Oh, tigers too but i digress. From the video I learned about the smaller but no less striking margay, the only cat with a prehensile tail.


• It was nice to hear the sounds of the jungle once again, and to see my dear friends the oropendola Cowbirds try to lay their eggs in the oropendola's beautifully weaved nests. But as justice would have it, sometimes the oropendola doesn't care because the cowbird chicks are more likely to attract a parasitic maggot that feeds on the chick from the inside out. In the video, you can see the maggot moving around under the chick's skin, pretty sick stuff. Check out the oropendola's pretty song.