Reticulated Python
& Masked Finfoot (1999)
Acrylic on
illustration board
20" x 30"
$17,400
| Capable
of attaining a length in excess of thirty feet, the reticulated
python (Python reticulatus) is by far Asia's biggest snake.
Ranging throughout most of southeast Asia and the Philippines,
as far east as Moluccas, the "rectic" is a versatile
reptile, occuring in all manner of habitats and feeding opportunistically
on most any animal it encounters, from rats to deer to birds
like this masked finfoot (Heliopais personata), an uncommon
and distant relative of the coot. I agonized over whether or
not to paint the female finfoot swimming beneath the surface,
which is atypical behavior according to most of the literature
(I've never seen this species in nature), but having read some
accounts of their occasional diving, and having seen their American
equivalent, the sungrebe, dive once, I decided to surrender to
my artistic impulses. The incidental species in this piece include
the butterfly Junonia almana, a robust damselfly (family
Lestidae), water strider (family Gerridae), a minnow (family
Cyprinidae), loach (family Cobitidae), forest softshell turtle
(Dogania subplana), and water skink (Tropidophorus
berdmorei). |
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