BUM RAP - FALSE ADVERTISING

For the last couple of weeks or so, I've been watching false advertising on my TV set and you'll never guess who was behind it. OK, give up? It's the Disney designed Space Center Theme Park at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston. And what was the false advertising? MAN-EATING PIRRAHNA. The Space Center was promoting an exhibit by telling viewers to come and "see man-eating pirrahnas." Folks, there is no such thing as a man-eating pirrahna. Shame on those advertisers!

I've made eight extended sojourns to the Amazon and I am always amazed at the tall tales that come out of that area. Two animals in particular have long gotten a bum rap. I'm talking about Pirrahnas and Anacondas. Now, if you've ever seen them, you will agree that Pirrahnas and Anacondas are not cute and cuddly creatures. Pirrahnas have an ugly face with sharp protruding teeth that give these fish a very menacing look. Anacondas are huge slimy acquatic snakes.

Movies and books have portrayed both animals as very aggressive killers of man and beast. Pirrahnas have been pictured as skeletizing cows in minutes and man in seconds. Pirrahnas eat mostly other fish, not man or cows. Anacondas have been pictured leaping out of tall trees to snatch away some poor unsuspecting hiker or jungle explorer. Anacondas don't venture far from the streams and lakes in which they dwell. They will come out of the water to sun themselves and to catch rodents and other small animals for an occasional meal.

I was first exposed to Pirrahnas in 1991. I was wading in a river in the Venezuelan Amazon when I felt something nibbling at my ankles. I asked my guide what it could be and when he told me it was probably pirrahnas I almost shit. I quickly highstepped my way to the bank when he called me back and told me not to worry. When I thought he had been kidding me, he took a piece of meat, put it on a hook tied to a string and threw it in the water. Within seconds he had hooked an ugly mean looking pirrahna.

Amazon villages are almost always located along river banks because the rivers provide a means of transportation and are a source of food for the Indians. The villagers bathe in the rivers and the children play and swim in them. I've seen many a toddler in pirrahna infested waters which assured me that pirrahnas do not pose any danger to mankind.

I've also come across a number of Anacondas in the wild, one of which appeared to be close to 20 feet long. It was about two-thirds out of the water, lying under a bush and guarding a capibara that it had earlier constricted. Apparently, it was not yet ready to eat its kill. (Capibaras are the world's largest rodents, sometimes exceeding 100 pound in weight.)

During my explorations I must have come across a dozen or so of these boas. Whenever I got close to them, they would eye me, but none of them ever made any threatening moves or noises. (I did pick up and hold a 12-14 footer on my shoulders at the zoo in Leticia, Columbia. While staggering under its weight, that sucker coiled its tail end several times around one of my arms. I've got the pictures to prove it.) So, I can say with confidence that Anacondas, like Pirrahnas, do not pose a threat to people.

Which brings me back to the Space Center Theme Park's false advertising. That promo about "man-eating pirrahnas" may bring in a few more visitors, but when all is said and done, what that TV ad really does is to keep promulgating an undeserved myth about a small ugly Amazon fish. The folks in charge of that theme park should be ashamed of themselves!