Jaguar in the Kitchen: My Life with Jungle Larry

By Nancy Tetzlaff

“Meet the wife, mother, animal lover, and savvy businesswoman that we all know as Safari Jane!”  --Jack Hanna

Jaguar in the Kitchen: My Life with Jungle Larry is the wonderfully entertaining story of the woman whose family made the animal world come alive in

• Language: English
• Publisher: International Zoological Society, Inc.
• Release date: Dec 4, 2019
• ISBN: 9780578535227

Book preview

CHAPTER ONE

Just Getting Started

A rasping grunt shook me awake. It was a sound I had never heard before, but I knew its source had to be something big—and probably dangerous. Exhausted from the previous day’s events, I had drifted off to sleep. As I now regained consciousness, I remembered vaguely where I was. The jungle sounds of macaws screeching and monkeys chattering gave it away, as did the realization that I was not in my comfortable bed back home. I was, in fact, tucked in a hammock in a small hut in some tropical place. I wasn’t in Cleveland anymore, that was for sure. I would later learn the sound that jolted me from my sleep was the territorial roar of a jaguar.

With some effort, I managed to raise my eyelids to better view my surroundings and, within a split second, I found myself wide awake. There, a mere six inches from my face, was a tarantula. And not just any tarantula. This one’s fuzzy legs must have spanned a good eight inches. It’s one thing to see an oversized tarantula in a zoo, safely behind glass, but the only thing separating this one from me was a flimsy sheet of mosquito netting draped over the hammock.

I’d met my husband Larry—Jungle Larry to his many fans—a couple of short years before. In that time, I had learned to handle every exotic animal he had, even the snakes. It would become my life’s work. But I’d never quite become used to the spiders. I was a true arachnophobe. Always had been, always would be. And here was one of the biggest, hairiest representatives of the arachnid class I’d ever seen. I handled the matter the only way I knew how: I found my voice and let out a scream.

It was November 1959 and we were in South America. British Guiana, to be precise. Larry had wanted to do some filming and bring back some young animals for our growing zoo at Chippewa Lake Park in Ohio. Such a safari made for a great school assembly, too, during the fall and winter months. He would show a film of the trip and then bring out actual animals from the place he’d traveled to. In ‘58, Larry had gone to the Australian outback. We hadn’t had the funds for both of us to go and Larry had asked me if it was all right that he go without me. I knew he felt bad about not being able to take me along and I also knew how important the trip was to him, so I hadn’t hesitated to give him my approval.

For the South America trip, we had the money for both of us and Larry insisted that for this safari, I go with him. He wanted me to be a part of everything he did. More than a part—a partner. I couldn’t say no. If I was going to live this lifestyle, I had to go all in, and in November of ‘59, that meant taking a trip to British Guiana.

I was certainly excited and a little anxious, too. This was my first big trip, and out of the country no less. Growing up, my single-income, middle-class family in Cleveland didn’t have the means for many vacations. My father was a truck driver and my mom was a full-time homemaker, as were most mothers of the day. Philadelphia was the farthest I’d been from home. During World War II, my father was in the Navy and we took a train to visit him while he was on leave there. Like a lot of homemakers, my mother had gone to work on behalf of the war effort, taking a job in a defense factory. They’d allowed her a few days off to see her husband and off we went, along with my paternal grandmother, Margaret Gettling. We visited the Liberty Bell while we were there, and although I was quite young, staring at that symbol of patriotism and sacrifice would leave a lifelong impression, making me all the more proud of my dad and all those who were defending the values the bell represented. Later, back at home, the city conducted air raid drills in the event bombers came to our shores. They called the drills brownouts. We had to turn off all the lights in the house. As a little girl, hiding under the dining room table, the sirens were terrifying to me.

And speaking of airplanes, this trip to British Guiana was my first time on one. Frankly, I was more concerned about the risks of air travel than I was about the dangers of the jungle. It didn’t help that we took off from the Cleveland airport at two in the morning, which just made the experience all the more mysterious. If the plane we took to Miami continues to exist somewhere, you can probably still see the indentations my fingers made in the armrests. From Miami, it was on to San Juan, Puerto Rico. We toured the city and from there it was a milk run of stops to Antigua, Martinique, and Trinidad, where we spent a couple of days. It was a good thing that by then I was getting more comfortable with flying.

Trinidad was enchanting; it was the first real time I’d ever spent in a tropical setting. The homes and buildings were colorful, and the people were friendly. In Port of Spain, the capital, we met up with Dr. Arthur Greenhall, known for his work with reptiles and bats. Art was a renowned zoologist, as well as an adventurer. Larry had met him years before at the University of Michigan. Larry had been doing some research work on snakes, and Art, a PhD, was an expert herpetologist there. Since Michigan, Art had traveled all over, eventually settling in Trinidad where he was appointed zoologist of the British colony. Among his other duties, he was in charge of the rabies program in Port of Spain, collecting serum from vampire bats. These bats were a real problem as they’d feast on horses and cows. Art was jokingly referred to as Dracula in the South America jungles where he was religiously trying to educate cattleman about the bats and the rabies serum.

We met at a cave where the doctor had been observing bat activity and I got the chance to film a vampire bat flying out of the cave into broad daylight, something they rarely do. In fact, Art said we might have been the only people he knew who had film footage of a wild vampire bat in the daytime.

Art also showed us leafcutter ants, which were fascinating. As their name implies, they cut off leaves, then they collectively carry the leaves over their bodies back to their nests for food. Later we watched a species of ant that literally cut a fingernail-thin path through a road, hauling the asphalt bits to their home a few yards away in the jungle. We hadn’t even arrived in British Guiana and I was already getting an education.

Finally, it was on to Georgetown, British Guiana, where we spent a couple of days at a rustic hotel called the Woodbine before going inland. The Woodbine was three floors and we were on the top one. There was no ceiling above us, just the rafters of the roof. There was no air conditioning, the walls were thin, and the bathroom facilities were down the hall. Then again, nobody had promised me luxury.

There was a veranda on our floor and from there I could see the people on the street below. There were few cars in those days and, besides going on foot, most of the transportation was done by donkeys and carts. On the first afternoon, I spotted a man beating his donkey, which had apparently decided on its own to stop and rest on the road, drawing the man’s ire. I was halfway out the door to run down and tell the man a thing or two about abusing animals when Larry grabbed me by the shoulder.

Oh, no, you can’t do that, he said.

Why not? Anybody could see that the donkey was hot, tired, and didn’t have the strength to pull the man’s cart.

From our hotel in Georgetown.

We can’t be involved. This isn’t our home; this isn’t our culture.

I supposed he was right but, for a while, I was just as upset with Larry as I was with the man beating the donkey.

The next day, we made plans to tour Kaieteur Falls, the largest, single drop waterfall in the world. At 741 feet, it’s not the highest, but it’s the greatest in water volume. Every second, 23,400 cubic feet of water flow over Kaieteur. The problem was that it was only accessible by seaplane, and the day we decided to go, a storm was blowing in.

We took a local taxi to the small airport on the river at the edge of town and stepped into a hangar that had definitely seen better days. By then, the rain was coming down in sheets and there were four- to five-foot waves on the river from which we were supposed to take off. Not only that, you needed to get into a rowboat to get out to where the plane was going to be. Needless to say, I had second thoughts, especially when I noticed, while waiting for our plane to come in, that another plane in the hangar literally had wire holding parts of it together.

Finally, our plane landed on the river and the incoming passengers got out and into the rowboat that had been dispatched for them. One of the passengers was a pregnant woman and it was no easy task to get her safely into the bouncing boat. And now we were supposed to get into that same rowboat and fly out of that churning river into the rainy sky on one of their patched-up planes? It seemed like a disaster waiting to happen and it was with no small sense of relief to hear the seaplane people tell us they were sorry but the conditions were no longer good for flying. I wanted to say, Really?

So much for Kaieteur Falls. The next morning we were ready to fly into the interior. The real adventure was now upon us—our safari. But if I’d become comfortable flying, my comfort level was soon to be dramatically downgraded. The plane to get into Karanambu, the ranch which was our destination, was an old DC-3 propeller plane without seats. Instead, there were two metal benches that ran the length of the plane’s interior, one on each side. No seatbelts. When you leaned back you had to be careful not to hit your head on the nuts and bolts that held the fuselage together. In the center of the plane, between the benches, was where the cargo went. The plane was a commuter plane, flown by bush pilots to ferry locals back and forth between the interior of the country and Georgetown, and there were all manner of crates and boxes in the center of the plane. Amid all of it, there were two, live, strapped-down bulls, neither one of which seemed especially happy to be there. I wasn’t either and I asked Larry for the twentieth time if he was absolutely positive there wasn’t a road into the place. No road, he confirmed. This is the only way.

There were five stops between Georgetown and Karanambu, all of them close enough that the pilot was never able to fly very high. Besides, the bush pilots used landmarks to guide them on these routes so they preferred to fly low. This meant we were never really able to find clear air. It was turbulence the whole way with the DC-3 dipping up and down between stops like a bronco. Feeling nauseous, I looked around for a restroom and wasn’t particularly surprised not to see one. No airsick bags, either. My strategy was to dump my purse and use it for an airsick bag if worse came to worst, but fortunately, I was able to keep my breakfast down and when we finally landed on a dirt strip near Karanambu, I’d never felt more appreciative of terra firma.

At the airstrip, we were greeted by our guide for the week, Tiny McTurk, a grizzled safari veteran with a weather-worn face and big grin. Howdy! he hollered to us, then pointed to his rickety Jeep and said, Hop on in! Twenty minutes later we were at our accommodations, a lodge with thatched guest huts. Primitive, but suitable.

The beds were no more than hammocks with mosquito netting and the air was hot and sticky, but I dropped off easily, weary from the day’s travel. Larry had gone down to the river, close by our hut. And that’s when the tarantula showed up. My scream brought Larry running, imagining that I saw a fer-de-lance snake or even a jaguar. When he saw the spider, he chuckled. Then he slowly reached down and allowed the tarantula to crawl onto his bare hand. He walked outside the hut and shortly returned.

You killed it, right? I asked. Tell me that you killed it.

Nope. But don’t worry. I’m here now.

Well you weren’t here when I woke up! Wait—what do you mean you didn’t kill it? I should have known. Of course Larry wouldn’t kill it. Not Jungle Larry. In fact, he told me that years before, he had his picture taken for Look magazine with a tarantula on his face. Good for him, I thought. For my part, I spent the rest of the trip on the lookout for those hairy monsters.

The next morning, Tiny took us up the Rupunini River in a small outboard boat. Wildlife was plentiful. Beautiful birds, chattering monkeys, and a few small snakes swimming along the waters. The river led us eventually to a lake where we trolled for piranhas. Before long, I caught one, a scary-looking, eighteen-inch thing that I pulled on board. Tiny took out his machete and decapitated it and I watched as the jaws continued chomping away, even after the head had become separated from the body. To this day, I have that head in a glass case, my first real safari souvenir.

British Guiana.

Not long after that, Tiny landed a bony, three-foot-long fish called an arowana. But in these waters, this giant wasn’t the prize. Tiny quickly prepared the fish into several pieces, each one of which he threw back into the water with a hook and a piece of wood that served as a bobber. Ten minutes later, one of the wood floats began to move and we followed it. Tiny leaned over the side of the boat, thrust his arm into the water, and grabbed hold of an eight-foot-long arapaima fish, one of the largest types of freshwater fish in the world. Some fishermen call it the beast fish, but I found the arapaima to be beautiful, with pink scales that had a golden edge. Years later, I would sell arapaima scales in our gift shop as they make natural nail files.

Beautiful or not, I wasn’t prepared when Tiny hurled the fish into the boat. There was barely enough room for the three of us without the addition of a massive, eight-foot fish bouncing us around. Fortunately, this wasn’t Tiny’s first fish rodeo and he quickly dispatched it. We wanted photos so folks back home would believe this fish story so we made for a nearby bank where Larry removed the fish and I took the photographic evidence. We’d need to wait for another time to bring one back alive.

We took river trips most days that week, always seeing something new. One of the most beautiful sights on the river was the giant water lilies, as wide as three-feet. Along the bottom of the lilies were long, sharp needles so you sure didn’t want to try to pick one up. One day, a young lady visiting from England came along with us. We ate oranges in the boat and when we rinsed our hands in the water, a piranha nipped at this young lady’s finger. They left me alone. The difference? As far as I could tell, it must have been her red fingernail polish which the piranha mistook for blood. I made a note to myself: if you cut finger, do not rinse in river.

Karanambu was a fascinating place. Every morning, I’d wake up to the sounds of motmot birds up in the