TEMPO.CO, Sao Paulo - The giant anteater (Myrmecophaga tridactyla) may seem harmless knowing that the animal has an elongated snouts equipped with a thin tongue, poor sense of sight, almost deaf, and teethless. However, the non-aggressive insect eater was reported to be deadly when they are threatened or feeling the pressure.
A research led by Vidal Haddad Jr., an associate professor at Sao Paulo State University's Botucatu Medical School, studied two cases of the anteater attacks.
The first case occurred in 2010, when an anteater attacked a 75-year-old man who was hunting in Brazil's Mato Grosso state, the scientists noted. The victim suffered a grave injury to his femoral artery and bled to death.
The second case was reported on the journal of Wilderness and Environmental Medicine. A 47-year-old man, who lived in a rubber plantation in Guajará County in Brazil's Amazonas State, near the border with Peru, went hunting with his two sons. Their dogs cornered an adult giant anteater and it went into its standing pose, wrote the researchers. The anteater 'grabbed' the man before he could make a move and his knife wounded the animal. The wound triggered his aggressiveness that led to the man's death.
The researchers said the cases should be a warning to "respect the boundaries between the wildlife and human, especially when they co-inhabit a given area."
The anteater inhabits the wildlife of American continent and their numbers continue to decrease. They are classified as 'vulnerable' on the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN)’s endangered species list.
LIVESCIENCE | PHYS.ORG | GABRIEL WAHYU TITIYOGA