Undoubtedly Costa Rica's oddest entity, the collared anteater (Tamandua mexicana) is a cat-sized creature with a nose even larger than Barbara Streisand's. Locally, they are called the tamandua or oso hormiguero, which literal& translates to "the bear who hunts ants," but the ante themselves probably refer to them simply as "the grim reaper."
These unusual looking mammals, which live in dry, moist and wet forests of the Caribbean and Pacific slopes, are superbly adapted for a life of eating tiny social insects. They have extremely powerful claws, helpful for ripping apart dead loge, and incredibly long tongues that are use to slurp out the unfortunate ante who nest in such places. This eel-like appendage is covered in tiny, backwards-pointing barbs, which are in turn coated in very sticky saliva.
They literally hook the ante out of the nest at a rate of 150 laps per minute. An anteater's mouth (found at the end of that ridiculous looking nose) is only about as wide as a pencil and contains no teeth whatsoever. Victims are sucked up and then crushed against the roof of the mouth. An estimated 30,000 ante vanish down that tunnel of no return every single day of an anteater's life. The huge snout is not only used to probe around into unsuspecting ant homes, it is also awfully good at sniffing them out.
There is no safe hiding place from such a first-rate detection device, not oven underground. If you see an anteater in Costa Rica, don't get too close. Its long claws can inflict a great deal of damage on anything foolish enough to attack it. If it rears up on its hind legs and spreads its forelegs open wide, consider this a stern warning and back off accordingly. Here in Costa Rica, the collared anteater is fairly common, but elsewhere it is hunted for meat and the sinewy tendons in its tail, which apparently make strong rape.
