Jeanette's Wild World of Nature: AHHHH! GET IT OFF ME!

[Jeanette X]

This thread is about all the creatures of nature that are outright unpleasant. The ones that make us wince but are ultimately a neccessary part of the ecosystem and should be appreciated for the role they play. And then left on someones pillowcase.
http://www.michigansportsman.com/SueLee_Lamprey.jpg
http://i.cnn.net/cnn/2002/TECH/science/04/04/sea.lampreys/story.lamprey.from.movie.jpg
http://www.uvm.edu/snr/lamprey/chinookwlamprey.jpg
The lamprey is the vampire of the aquatic world. Adult lampreys act as parasites on a large variety of fishes and sea mammals. They attach to the host using it their sucker mouths, which have very sharp teeth arranged in concentric circles. Once attached, the lamprey opens a wound onto the skin of the host using its rasping tongue, and then it feeds on blood and other bodily tissue. Some species can grow up to three feet long.
http://oceanlink.island.net/oinfo/hagfish/hagknotting.gif
The hagfish eats marine worms and other invertebrates, and has been known to burrow into the bodies of dead and dying animals and eat them from the inside out. The hagfish can almost instantly secrete mass amounts of slime as defense mechanism. They can actually tie themselves into knots, which helps them to escape predators, clean of excess slime from their bodies, pull in food, and burrow into a carcass. They also sneeze to unclog their nostrils of their own slime. In Korea almost 5 million pounds of hagfish meat is consumed each year. Hagfish skin is also processed into "eelskin" products, such as wallets and purses.

[Rongi]

Ugh... :puke

I hate lampreys and hag fishes. I honestly can't stand the ugly little bastards.

[Cybernetico]

An animal topic isn't an animal topic without

http://www.boomspeed.com/acpcybernet/Sophie1.jpg

SOPHIE!

PS. those are some cute little critters :/

[Rongi]

That is a rather ugly dog...

[HickMan]

:lol

[Cybernetico]

That is a rather ugly dog...

You must be blind or something. Sophie is easily the cutest dog I've ever laid eyes upon. I'ts just a bad shot, or something O_o

[Rongi]

Hey, you're the one posting her picture in an ugly animal thread.

[HickMan]

www.mrwinkle.com this is the strangest dog ever. >:

[Cybernetico]

www.mrwinkle.com this is the strangest dog ever. >:

http://www.mrwinkle.com/diary9.JPG

HOLY CRAP THAT THING IS UGLY

But on the other hand, the dog is actually pretty cute ;)

[FS]

It's so strange, I want Cybernetico to die, and he's just not dying. Maybe I've been a bad boy this year.

[UnDeath]

ah, shit. Sorry FS, I'll get on that right away. Ya know..... tips are appreciated. >:

[Cybernetico]

It's so strange, I want Cybernetico to die, and he's just not dying. Maybe I've been a bad boy this year.

What did I do now?

[Rongi]

Good god man...are you this dense? Is there anything in that cavity in your skull?

[UnDeath]

oh, dont take it personally. Its business, ya know.

[Jeanette X]

AHEM! Back to creepy things! >:
http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/arthropoda/uniramia/centipede.gif
http://dougsinc.com/LifeInMex/FloraFauna/Centipede.jpg
Centipedes.

[kellychaos]

Ugly animals ROCK! Spiders next, please. :)

[Jeanette X]

http://www.xs4all.nl/~ednieuw/Spiders/Argiope_bruennichi_D1104.jpg
This...thing is called an Argiope Bruennichi. It is found in Europe.

http://www.xs4all.nl/~ednieuw/Spiders/solpugid3.jpg

This is a sun spider.

http://www.srv.net/~dkv/hobospider/index_files/malehob2.jpg
Hobo Spider.

http://www.xs4all.nl/~ednieuw/Spiders/Atypidae/Atypus_piceus_D1079.jpg
Purse web spider. Almost beetle-like, isn't it? It belongs to a suborder callled Orthognatha, or primitive spiders.

http://www.xs4all.nl/~ednieuw/Spiders/Erisidae/Eresus_niger.jpg
Lady-bird spider. So named because of it's resembalence to a lady-bird (ladybug).

http://www.xs4all.nl/~ednieuw/Spiders/Scytodidae/Scytodes_thoracica1727.jpg
Spitting spider. So named because it spits a poisonous silken substance over its prey.

http://www.xs4all.nl/~ednieuw/Spiders/Oxyopidae/Oxypes_sp1_D0399.jpg
Lynx spider. Look at those barbs!

Please note: These pictures are mostly close-ups. These spiders really no where near as big as these photos would make them seem.
Thank God.

Spiders terrify me. I know its irrational, but dear God, I can't stand them. My phobia is rather embarrasing, especially because I strive to understand and appreciate nature in its fullest, including the unpleasant parts. I know that most of them are harmless but...:faint
But I suppose this thread might help me to get over my fears. Perhaps someday I might even...pick one up. :chatter

[Sethomas]

I was once exploring a cave on my late great-grandmother's property. I wriggled myself into a small cavern and turned on a flashlight to find the wall itself practically crawling, as its entire surface area was covered with cave spiders. I knew that if I bore any adverse reaction, my sister would go in hysterics.

That's how I got over my fear of spiders.

[Kitty of Doom]

Your thread is giving me nightmares :chatter Once when I was at a zoo, there was display of walking stick insects and they were huge, about 8 or 9 inches long. I still get freaked out just thinking about it.

[Anonymous]

right now our apartment has become infested with those damn centipedes (but the house ones with the really long legs).
I am going to vacuum a bunch today in a pathetic attempt to save myself

[HickMan]

God speed Doopa. God speed.

[Ninjavenom]

Spiders make me scream like a preteen girl. They wig me the fuck out. :(

[Spectre X]

Spiders are fucking cool.

What you should be watching out for are Box jellyfishes. They're the most venomous creature in the seas according to the Discovery channel, which is complete bullshit, since the most poisenous creature in the seas, and even WORLD is the stonefish.

anyways, back to the jellyfish, they're about 30 foot long and you dies within a couple of minutes because of paralisis, while enduring the worst pain in the entire world.

[Jeanette X]

Eeek. Re, you poor thing. My sympathies.
http://www.nhm.org/expeditions/vietnam/graphics/leech.jpg
Leech sucking on a human.
http://entomology.unl.edu/images/scorpions/deserthairy_scorp.jpg
Scorpion.
http://www.angelfire.com/yt/kpyehi2/images/Phobaeticusseratipes.jpg
Stick insect. Ready to drop onto Kitty's head. ;)
http://www.entomology.wisc.edu/insectam/images/walk-head.JPG
http://www.acay.com.au/~adderley/enviro/stick3.jpg
Pet stick insects. What is wrong with these people?
http://www.globalclassroom.org/hcrab2.jpg
Horseshoe crab on its back. One time, some marine expert came to my elementry school with one. He turned it over it had all thes little legs kicking in the air. It was fucking creepy.

[Rongi]

I tried to eat a horse shoe crab once

Tasted like bile :(

[Jeanette X]

I tried to eat a horse shoe crab once

Tasted like bile :(

Seriously? In a restaurant?

[Rongi]

Nah, I cought one :/. I was young and stupid...mostly stupid

[James]

Jeanette is like the Brian Fellow of the baords.

I am going to vacuum a bunch today in a pathetic attempt to save myself

You've stopped trapping them under glasses?

[Kitty of Doom]

Really any type of insect freaks me out but especially walking sticks(thanks Jeanette X :/ )

I think my insane fear started when I was aroung 5 or so. I went to one of my mom's friend's house and that year there was an over population of gypsie moths. So when we got to this lady's house, gypsie moth caterpillars were raining from the trees and covering the driveway. We needed an umbrella to walk to the house because there were so many and our shoes were covered in caterpillar guts. They were even in the house....When we finally got home I found some in the car and on my back. It was a very tramatizing experience.

[FS]

I had a terrarium full of little walking sticks as a kid. At one point they grew to 7 or 8 inches long, which was pretty cool, but the terrarium just wasn't big enough for them to live in. So I set them free.

Most spiders cause me to move to the other end of the room, and if they move I'm on the furniture. Yes, the woman of my dreams must be able to crush spiders with a single blow. I've never seen a centipede or millipede any bigger than an inch or two, but if I did I'd probably utter a Ned Flanders shriek and faint.

[Poxpower]

I caught a stick insect as a kid and I kept it as a pet. They are cool because they move slowly and they aren't really threatening, with their small head and all. They're probably some of the coolest insects on earth. BTW I didn't keep it too long, as one morning, I woke up and its box ( I kept it on some toy figures box) was empty... never knew if it escaped into my room or if my parents set him free.

Now, what I REALLY hate are house milipedes. They comes from mexico and now spread as far north as Canada ( I know, I have some in my house)...
Ewww... and now it's the summer and they'll come out again. I already killed 3 this season, and one escaped into some boxes... Actually that was tonight... it's still there I bet...
waiting to make it's move....

[Jeanette X]

Wow Kitty, thats awful. :( Even I can handle gypsy caterpillars. I kill them anyway though, because they are a non native species that got accidentally introduced when some asshole brought them thinking he could cross them with silkworms and get rich.

http://www.amnh.org/exhibitions/hall_tour/spectrum/specimens/a203.jpg
Tapeworm. Always cook your meat well. :puke

http://www.sfsm.org/millipede.jpg
Giant African millipede.

[kellychaos]

right now our apartment has become infested with those damn centipedes (but the house ones with the really long legs).
I am going to vacuum a bunch today in a pathetic attempt to save myself


Waxing anthropomorphically, I can't help but wander what the surviving centipedes are thinking upon seeing their fellow pedes being sucked up in "the big wind" ... whether they see it as a sign from the "Great Centipede God" ... whether there's a Nostradamus-type centipede in the cracks of the house claiming that he foretold the coming of the trajedy ... "It's all there on the 'centipede scrolls"! If you centipedes knew how to interpret my work properly, you would see that!"

[Sethomas]

The entomologist in me tells me that they don't, because they're stupid fucking insects.

[Daphne]

I'm terrified of lampreys and spiders, but I respect spiders and can appreciate that they are beautiful yadda yadda, just as long as they stay the fuck away from me! Lampreys are one reason I will never ever swim in a lake! :chatter

I won't kill them, but I will run and make Declan put them outside

[kellychaos]

Yeah, but you ever try to kill one of those things? One hundred stompings all in vain. The thing was STILL moving.

[Anonymous]

so far I have not seen any more of the centipedes since the vacuuming
and by posting this of course that means one will scamper buy within the next 5 minutes

[UnDeath]

they just all want cake. :(