Seafoodpunch

In Madagascar lives a creature that looks so bizarre it is no wonder that the local Malagasy and Sakalava people believe it to be a symbol of death. The menacing omen comes in the shape of an aye-aye: Its piercing orange eyes, bony fingers, large, rabbit like incisors and bat-like ears definitely give this nocturnal primate a unique appearance. Some tribesmen even go so far as to claim that the aye-aye will sneak into your home at night and use its ridiculously long, slender middle finger to pierce your heart (I like to imagine him doing this while cackling maniacally).

These beliefs couldn’t be further from the truth. The creature that the local villagers are so petrified to come across, spends most of its time searching out grubs, nuts, nectar and fruits rather than people to condemn to death. Who has time for that anyway?

Unfortunately, superstitions associated with the aye-aye result in the animal being killed on sight. This poor little thing is pretty much killed because it is born ugly.

It doesn’t help that the aye-aye is almost tame when compared to other wild animals. Aye-ayes are known to walk right up to naturalists and into busy villages, raiding farms for coconuts, mangoes or lychees. This makes them an easy target for individuals who want to avoid the curse by killing the primate.

In Gerald Durrel’s short novel, “The Aye-Aye and I”, Durrel describes how an aye-aye fearlessly crawled onto his shoulder and proceeded to gently probe the inside his ear for a tasty bug. (I wouldn’t be able to handle a flea covered animal poking the inside of my ear, but naturalists have wet dreams about this sort of thing.) Unfortunately, this poor aye-aye found nothing but tasteless wax in the ear and simply clamored back up into the trees with what is described as a disappointing grunt.

Here is the real reason behind the ‘killer’ finger: The aye-aye has a unique foraging behavior when searching for its preferred food: It will tap at trees with the tip of its claw and use echolocation to find any grubs hiding underneath the bark. Once found, the aye-aye will rasp away at the wood with its teeth and insert the  finger in question into the larvae’s burrow to pull it out.

With habitats shrinking, unlucky aye-ayes stumble into local villages more and more often and if found, don’t make it out. Hopefully, local people have begun to realize that no aye-aye has ever singled out a person to die.