With parrots and snakes in his luggage and bird eggs tucked into his underwear, an Austrian tourist has been arrested and charged with animal trafficking, Brazilian police said.
“He put [the eggs] near his testicles so they would be at nest temperature,” a police spokesman said.
Police discovered 21 parrots, four parakeets and two snakes hidden in two large suitcases carried by Austrian botanist Johann Zillinger. They also found Zillinger had rolled five parakeet eggs into a sock and nestled them in his underwear.
“Since some of the parakeets that he had with him were newborns, we assume that some of the eggs had already hatched.”
Tipped by an anonymous call, Rio de Janeiro police arrested the Austrian on Monday as he climbed into a taxi en route to a flight to Europe.
Police said Zillinger bought the animals in the Amazon port city of Belen and planned to sell them in Europe.
