Bushmeat is still a common commodity in Laos. Such unusual goods sometimes can be found at the most ordinary markets and roadside stalls.

The chef of a street restaurant in Laos showed me this chopped monitor lizard explaining that a customer had ordered to cook this. An image taken with a mobile

The monitor lizard is common in Southeast Asia although it seems strange to me that someone consumes these carrion-eaters. But recently, I spotted rarer types of bushmeat at a market in Xepon.

Xepon is a tiny town, located in mountainous Laos, with the only asphalted street. It has a 24h convenience store and two banks but there is also a lot of the village in Xepon; for example, an abundance of mongrels scurrying on the streets.

This is how most buildings of the Xepon market look like: flimsy sheds filled with cheap Chinese factory goods.

The interior of the main market building is more monumental. They sell vegetables and fruits there as well as all varieties of meat so the smell is appropriate there. Mice aren't uncommon there too.

I used to visit the place to buy mangoes and melons, and, one day, I came across something unusual:

This is, most probably, a black giant squirrel, Ratufa bicolor (wiki).

I couldn't ask who and why might buy it since I don't speak Lao but the Internet confirmed my guess: Lao people eat not only monitor lizards but squirrels either.

I saw another species, a rarer one. This was a flying squirrel and its babies:

The trader showed me what this beast had been once:

I can imagine how beautiful she was while flying.

After a research on the Web, I concluded that it might be Biswamoyopterus laoensis. Compare my images with the the one on Wikipedia - they look identical.

This is a rare species which was discovered in 2012

This discovery has happened at a bushmeat market in Central Laos:

The specimen of the Laotian giant flying squirrel was incidentally found on display for sale at a bush meat market in Central Lao PDR... ...“It is a remarkable discovery for science. It is a very rare species with large body size,” explained Mr Daosavanh Sanamxay... ...Biswamoyopterus laoensis is a large flying squirrel that weighs 1.8 kg and measures about 42 inches (1.08 m) in total length – the body is about 18 inches (0.46 m) long and the tail is 24 inches (0.62 m) long - www.sci.news

A huge animal which fits the description above.

It was especially sad to see that the killed family of flying rodents began to decompose - apparently, there are not many people in Xepon who want to eat squirrels.

More stories from Southeast Asia are ahead! Check out the previous ones on my personal Pinmapple map.

I took the images of the both species of the squirrels on June 24, 2023 with a Nikkor 50mm f/1.8G on a full frame Nikon D750 in Xepon, Savannakhet Province, Laos.